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.

Fortitude—enduring the tired, tedious and unremarkable chores—is what makes the difference between those who dream and those who do.

Why am I talking about this? Because recently I saw some quote scroll past on social media. It was something (of course) posted by one of those super happy “life coach” people.

Though I’m certain the quote was meant to inspire, it hit a sour note with me. It seemed dismissive of the pain, sacrifice and—yes, suffering—of those willing to dream, and then stick to that dream. It bypassed the fortitude necessary for success.

I don’t recall the quote’s exact wording (they’re all so similar), but the saccharin essence was the same. Apparently, if you don’t LOVE every single moment of what you’re doing, then maybe you don’t have the right career.

Keep searching! Dream! You have a right to be HAPPY! If it isn’t making you HAPPY, then MOVE ON!

See, writing—much like any worthy undertaking—comes part and parcel with a lot of drudgery and loads of stuff we’d rather not do.

Fortitude & Learning Curve Drudgery 

A lot of folks believe that just because they’re proficient in their native language, they are then automatically qualified to write amazing fiction. Yeah…no.

Not judging at all. I used to be one of those people. I had zero concept how ridiculously hard it was to craft a readable story, let alone a good one.

Writing a novel that could span anywhere from 50K to 150K words (depending on genre) that manages to grab then hold a reader’s interest? AHHHH! Balancing plot points, plot arc, character, dialogue, scene and sequel, A-lines, B-lines, on and on?

It doesn’t take too long to understand why many great authors turned to booze and drugs.

*gives Poe a pass on the whole “heroin addiction'” thing*

Far too many writers start out believing the first novel they write is perfect, and if anyone counters this? They fall apart. Some give up. A few hire “editors” who are happy to tell them “the other meanie editor was totes unprofessional and it’s fiiiine to have fourteen POVs…all from cats.”

Others double-down on the denial and write a sequel or—God help us all—a series of equally crappy books that don’t sell.

Why?

Because learning to write novels is hard.

I’ve been through this, myself. My two formative mentors both made me cry…a LOT. And I am NOT a person who cries.

These mentors were nothing like my writing group. My writing group was so encouraging!

Bob and Les didn’t tell me my writing was unicorn tears, they told me it was more like what might come out of the other end of a unicorn.

No, not a unicorn. A hyena with tapeworm and a bad case of mange.

*weeps*

I didn’t love writing the same stuff over and over. Guess what? Didn’t always love reading and rereading the books they recommended I study.

Come to think of it, I didn’t love putting out my best only for it to come back with so much red I wondered if it had been hit by a bus then SHOT before they returned it.

Sure I could have quit. Thought about it a lot. A lot. Because shouldn’t I LOOOVE every moment of what I do? But, I didn’t quit because I wanted to become an excellent writer. I required more than glittery sparkly talent. I had to hone and develop fortitude.

I’m still a work in progress.

My critique group were fantastic cheerleaders, which we need…but not necessarily to make us better.

Cheerleaders look super pretty, but cheerleaders don’t train touchdowns.

Coaches who call out bad form, terrible plays, and awful habits create winners. These experts are hired to criticize, make a player watch footage over and over and, if warranted, do cherry-pickers until the player wants to DIE. Might seem “mean” but THIS is what will help that player make touchdowns.

Drudgery. Not pom-pom waving.

Fortitude: Welcome to the GRIND

There’s drudgery in the actual writing. Oh no! Yes, you heard it here first. Writing, while one of the BEST jobs in the world, contains more than its fair share of suckage.

The first draft can be loads of fun, until the mire of Act Two where you find yourself contemplating sudden and unexpected alien abduction—either for yourself to spring you from writing, or for your characters because you’ve messed up somewhere in the plot and written yourself into a corner.

Becoming successful in writing (or anything really) is never in the BIG things we do. It’s the compilation of a lot of small acts that build up over time.

It is showing up day after day even when we’d rather get a root canal than figure out what went sideways somewhere between page 1 and page 400.

We have to research, proofread, edit, revise, and all of this takes focus and time and pain. By the time a book is “ready” to be published, odds are pretty decent we’ll hate our own book and hope we never have to read it again.

***FYI: The feeling passes…eventually. Most of the time. Maybe.

Publishing Drudgery

For those who still want to traditionally publish, there is the drudgery of writing synopses and query letters and researching agents. Add the drudgery of the actual querying and subsequent waiting.

Meanwhile, most of us have day jobs and laundry and family members who expect to be fed every day #HighMaintenance.

Oh, and make sure to start writing the next book (refer to the love-fest above).

For those who choose a non-traditional path, we have to locate and hire the best people. Or maybe learn to format or design a cover ourselves. There may be multiple iterations of a cover. Then, if we believe we’ve found all our typos in our seventeen (hundred) passes? *clutches sides laughing*

And if we believe the proofreaders and editors caught all them too? Maybe, but..

On top of this, add in bookkeeping, record keeping, accounting, building a platform, understanding keywords and SEO and blah, blah, blah.

Suffice to say that YES, writing is a WONDERFUL job! I wouldn’t be here twenty years later if it was all bad. Yet, I do have to confess that choosing to become a writer showed me the worst parts of my character…in Technicolor.

I didn’t start blogging because I EVER believed my blog would be what it is today with millions of unique visitors. Want to know why I began blogging? I had ZERO self-discipline.

I’d become a person who didn’t want to do anything that I didn’t LOVE. If I wasn’t having FUN, then clearly I’d chosen the wrong career, right?

Wrong.

The Fortitude Factor

People who reach their goals and dreams are different for sure. Are they more gifted? Talented? Unusually good-looking? Perhaps. But, more often than not, these folks excel at handling the boring parts of the dream.

To which I shall refer to one of my favorite books on achievement. James Clear’s Atomic Habits (which I HIGHLY recommend), is fabulous. Yet, this quote in particular piqued my attention:

The greatest threat to success is not failure but boredom. We get bored with habits because they stop delighting us. The outcome becomes expected. And as our habits become ordinary, we start derailing our progress to seek novelty. Perhaps this is why we get caught up in a never-ending cycle, jumping from one workout to the next, one diet to the next, one business idea to the next. As soon as we experience the slightest dip in motivation, we begin seeking a new strategy—even if the old one was still working.

~ James Clear, Atomic Habits

You have NO idea how often I hear, “If I only had the TIME, I’d write more.” As if time is laying around in the couch cushions with the petrified Cheerios and the TV remote no one’s seen Twilight was popular.

Hey, I have been guilty here, too. Still can fall into old (bad) habits if I fail to remain vigilant. Yes, even after a pandemic when we all had more time than we knew what to do with.

The reason people (mistakenly) believe they must FIND TIME? It’s likely because they’ve hit the part of the writing process that’s actual WORK. It’s ceased to be a glorious high.

And, if they don’t start a new book (chasing the high), then they put off writing altogether using excuses more creative than their plot ideas.

Hey! Told y’all I have been guilty too…so no hating .

Yet, when we look at anything worth achieving, from writing an amazing book to being a great parent to running a profitable business, we see that it is how these individuals handle the millions of unremarkable unexciting and downright soul-crushing (but necessary) tasks that makes all the difference.

We see the same common denominator in every success story, from the legendary athletes willing to do the same drills over and over until perfected to the entrepreneurs who mined drudgery for the edge they needed to outpace all competition.

Fortitude: Can You Handle Being BORED?

Everyone loves new beginnings. The new relationship with no baggage and all hugs and kisses, the smell of the fresh notebook, the empty page waiting for all of our brilliant ideas. We love the new blog because it holds so much promise.

Then there is the new workout from YouTube, the new diet we found on Instagram, the new craft project we saw on Pinterest….

A lot of us fixate on whether we can handle the BIG moments, the MAJOR crises but I’d actually offer different advice. We need to ask the hard question.

Can we fall in love with pain and process as much as the end result? Everyone loves the summit selfie but few want the climb. It comes with hypoxia and pretty good odds you’ll die and no one will be able to claim your frozen corpse…ever.

Many of us LOVE the idea of six-pack abs…but we LOVE tacos more. We struggle after a few weeks. Why? Because we are tired, sore, and even though we’ve been working out for a WHOLE MONTH, we still don’t have a ripped physique.

Heck, we can’t even see a muscle. We’re tired of the pile of smelly clothes, the aches and pains and having to measure all our food. It isn’t FUN. In fact, it’s downright tedious.

We don’t LOVE the gym, the job, the book, the YouTube channel anymore because it’s day after day of nothing all that special…and pain.

Lots of that.

Catching Fire

Yet, all these small actions add up over time. When we embrace the dull actions and commit, we will eventually ignite. Ray Bradbury poetically asserted paper had an ignition point of 451 degrees Fahrenheit. The actual number is about thirty degrees higher.

Paper will burst into flames at about 480 degrees Fahrenheit (without being directly exposed to flame).

Using this analogy, let’s take our metaphorical paper and heat it to 100 degrees Fahrenheit, then 250, then 300, then 440, then 451. Boy, this is boring and taking a LONG time and taking energy. Nothing is happening.

Heat it to 460, then 470, then 477 and then throw up your hands because paper NEVER sets on fire without a high-budget marketing plan…I mean match.

Or, maybe there is a marked transformation somewhere between 477 degrees and 482 degrees. At 477 degrees Fahrenheit all looks the same. Oh but add in a little more energy and IGNITION. And this ignition all occurs within a range of a couple degrees.

Then…BOOM!

The same goes for becoming a successful author (as in a professional who’s PAID to play with our imaginary friends). A major key to success largely rests on how we handle the boring parts. Can we keep going, keep putting on the heat when it looks as if nothing is happening?

Success doesn’t have a canonized ignition point. If it did, being successful would be easy. Fortitude is a massive game changer.

If I knew I had to write five books, three series, add in a hundred blogs and forty three good reviews to reach literary stardom? Dang skippy I’d stick with it. There wouldn’t be ANY drudgery, because I’d have certainty.

But that’s the problem.

The ignition point for succeeding in anything is anything but certain (and might not even exist in some cases). It differs between people, generations, goals, industries, abilities, etc. We DON’T KNOW and THAT is precisely why drudgery can so easily undo us if we lack the fortitude to outlast it.

In the End

I want all your dreams to catch fire—your dreams to write, create, to be an excellent parent or partner, to achieve the remarkable.

If you can appreciate that every masterpiece began as a blank canvas, a hunk of marble, an ugly cement foundation, a sketch, or an idea and that IN BETWEEN there was a lot of wash, rinse, repeat and fortitude (which we can control)? You’re on your way to reaching those goals.

We’re rarely limited by our talent, yet we’re all too often hobbled by impatience. Drudgery makes us cave in too soon. It takes time to hone skills, learn a craft, build an audience, etc. Just keep pressing and hopefully you’ll see your ignition point and it will be the most beautiful light you’ve ever seen.

Then you get to do it again for the next goal . *smoochies*

But, you’ll be better and stronger because you know to expect the span of suck before the breakthrough! You will have strengthened and honed the fortitude required to finish. And the cool thing is, the more we work it, the stronger it gets.

What Are Your Thoughts?

I love hearing from you! Do you struggle with the doldrums in your dreams? Is it hard not to just start something new? Are your fortitude muscles weak? Have you been starting over so much that maybe that’s why you aren’t further along? Are you so sick of your book you want to cry? #GotTheTShirt

Don’t you wish we had the magic “temperature” where our dreams LIT UP? Some way to know if we were close? Or even heading in the correct direction? Have you struggled with learning to finish what you start? Been too easily distracted?

The post Fortitude: Dream, Do, Then Keep on DOING Day After Day appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

Schadenfreude is a word that many of y’all might not have heard of, yet we’ve all felt it. Interestingly enough, it can be a great tool to keep our audience interested and breathlessly wanting more. What is schadenfreude, other than a fifty dollar word we can toss around to impress friends and colleagues?

Schadenfreude—a combination of the German words for damage and joy—is the pleasure we feel at the misfortune of others.

Before anyone gets too judgy on me, we have all felt it.

Have you ever had some driver on the highway who believed they were above the rules and didn’t need to merge and take turns? Instead they sped up the shoulder so they could cut the line instead of patiently waiting their turn? Schadenfreude is the delicious enjoyment you felt when there actually was a police officer present who summarily pulled them over and ticketed the bejeezus out of them.

Don’t you judge me. Y’all know you love it, too.

We humans, by and large, have a sense of justice encoded in our psyche. This is why even a preschooler has a level of acumen usually reserved for an IRS auditor when adults pass out candy. They sense what is fair and unfair, right and wrong.

This ingrained sense of right and wrong and fair and unfair is part of what drives our need for a sense of justice. We don’t like it when others “get away” with doing something we perceive as “wrong.”

Shades of Schadenfreude

Therein lies the deliciousness of schadenfreude…the what we consider “wrong.”

Like most things involving the human psyche, this isn’t black and white, rather it exists on a spectrum. There is wonderful thrill of pleasure we feel when a speeder gets a (deserved) ticket that can go as far as total dehumanization of others and a delight at their complete destruction.

Schadenfreude is story jet fuel.

Before you might believe you are too “evolved” for such feelings, how many movie plots pivot on the bullies finally getting a taste (or more) of their own medicine? When there is a gross power imbalance, and that imbalance is abused, we humans can turn positively feral.

One of my favorite authors, Lucy Foley, wields schadenfreude like few other authors I’ve read. The Guest List and The Midnight Feast are page-turning dark delights. Alice Berman is another author who uses this darker side of human nature to create a thrilling story in I Eat Men Like Air.

Why do I love these books? Because these authors (stories) pick apart “the beautiful people.” From old money to self-anointed Instagram influencer demi-gods-in -their-own-minds, these stories pry at something primal in all of us…that some people are “better.”

Instead of characters who are grateful for a blessed life dripping in privilege, they are the entitled. They amuse themselves at the suffering of others purely for sport. Not only that, but they take great delight in how they, themselves, are above the rules. When these sorts of people commit crimes, the “real” world cannot punish them.

But Author Gods can.

Lovely Loathing

Foley and Berman are of the suspense-thriller variety, but Kevin Follet is another author who is unparalleled at whipping up a fire of resentment that rivals the fires of Gehenna. When I read Pillars of the Earth, I literally had to keep taking breaks reading the book because my own level of hatred overwhelmed me.

Like any book, Pillars of the Earth isn’t for everyone. It nearly wasn’t for me. Every time I considered throwing in the towel, I I found I couldn’t stop because I HAD to know if there was any kind of justice in this mad, mad world.

All of these books have a common thread. Raw, beautiful exquisite revenge justice.

We are ALL wired with a sense of right and wrong.

Even sociopaths have a sense of justice.

Read Martha Stout’s The Sociopath Next Door. A sociopath might not lose any sleep emptying your bank account, but would be horrified if you did the same to him.

Follet masterfully wove situations where I was rendered utterly and hopelessly powerless.

What is the epitome of being a victim? ZERO POWER. When evil strikes, what does it do to a person?

It strips away their power.

From money crimes to sex crimes, to hate crimes to murder it’s the same. Arson, abduction, terrorism, shootings, sex trafficking, burglaries, large-scale vandalism, gossip, slander, lies, it hits us all in the same place.

It makes us afraid and vulnerable and impotent.

What makes it worse? When we KNOW who’s done this, but this is a person no one can touch.

This was what made me practically foam at the mouth reading Pillars of the Earth. Because the story is (loosely) based on actual history. In the Middle Ages, nobility and high-ranking clergy got away with a LOT of really, really bad things.

Talk about powerlessness to the power of a thousand.

*Kristen punching things* *grabbing for inhaler* *ponders subscribing to Hallmark channel*

Yet, it kept me listening (turning pages) because I could not rest until the world was set right and justice was served. I wasn’t even sure it would be or could be. And if it was, HOW?

THAT, my friends, is some fine storytelling (so I am extremely glad I didn’t return the book). Also, THAT is the raw power of schadenfreude.

Villains & Schadenfreude

There are many ways to create legendary villains. And, keep in mind, there are different types of villains. Though, I recommend giving the villain a sympathetic goal, like the word wrong exists on a spectrum, so does the word sympathetic.

I get that far too many “normal people” think writing is easy. That if they only had enough time they’d be the next J.K. Rowling or George R.R. Martin. Sadly, no number of lockdowns is enough to disabuse some folks of the notion that storytelling is more than playing with imaginary friends.

To tell great stories, we are required to think differently than regular people.

***Refer to 13 Reasons Writers are Mistaken for Serial Killers

A book is more than a lot of flowery words, it is a peek into what makes people tick. Which is all well and good except some people’s “clockwork” is arguably manufactured in HELL.

Villains (antagonists) cannot want what they want for no reason. “Just cuz” is not good enough. When storytelling, we must be capable of violence. That is the only way for the “happy ending” to have any meaning.

***And before you think this is only for gritty genres, remember most fairy tales have some pretty horrifying villains.

Even the most revolting people in all the works I have thus far mentioned, deep down, believed themselves the heroes of their own stories. No matter how horrible they were, they genuinely could not see themselves honestly. Their world was a funhouse mirror designed to warp them into something they were not.

That said, some characters deserve destruction for one simple reason.

They are beyond redemption.

They are the rabid dogs of fiction. Writers and audiences alike know that to let some characters live or remain free is unacceptable. They are poison.

Why schadenfreude is such an incredible literary device is because it speaks to justice, which is universal. When crafting a villain (or even side characters who serve as antagonists), what universal rules are they breaking? Why? How? Now, can you dig deeper until the pages BLEED?

Villains & Cognitive Distortion

To a degree, all characters in our story are dealing with cognitive distortions. If they aren’t, then they aren’t interesting. All humans struggle with personalizing, catastrophizing, minimizing, justifying, unattainable standards, wishful thinking, etc.

In fact, for your touring pleasure, here is a list of 50 Common Cognitive Distortions.

All characters should have a cognitive distortion–to a degree–because all characters should arc.

While the MC or other positive forces (allies), grow, mature and evolve, the villain does the opposite. The villain devolves. They become even more convinced of their righteous cause, even more controlling, raise their already absurd standards to new levels of ridiculous, etc.

Ideally, we will give some reason for why the villain does what he does or believes what he believes. While we might not be able to, say, empathize with the actual cognitive distortion, we (the audience) can empathize with either having experienced the distortion ourselves OR the reason for the distortion.

For example, I cannot relate to the same level of entitlement as Francesca Meadows in The Midnight Feast. I am not old money, reared to believe I am privileged and entitled BUT I DO viscerally remember the first time I met another kid named “Kristen” and the raw fury I felt that another kid in my preschool had MY NAME!

MY NAME. MINE.

It’s a silly example, but she had to be destroyed that childlike rage is something a good story can tap into to give us the proverbial “sympathy for the devil.”

Mene, Mene, Tekel, Parsin

The Bible, in the Book of Daniel, tells the story of Belshazzar, who was King Nebuchadnezzar’s successor. Talk about a guy with an ego problem! He holds a banquet for all the nobility and thinks that calling for all the holy vessels from the Jewish Temple is a great idea…since they totally didn’t have enough cups *flips hair*.

What Belshazzar didn’t know—and likely would not have cared even if he did—was that he’d committed a great sacrilege. Y’all know the phrase we toss around, “Read the writing on the wall.” Well, this is where it comes from.

After Belshazzar uses all the holy vessels as Dixie Cups for his Meta-Influencer BBQ, a disembodied hand appears and writes Mene, Mene, Tekel, Parsin on the wall.

He can’t read the writing on the wall (nod to Shakespeare and IRONY) and calls for Daniel to translate the message, which was in Aramaic.

God tells Belshazzar that 1) his days are numbered (another nod to Shakespeare) 2) that his kingdom will fall, and 3) that he has been weighed, measured and found wanting.

There are good reasons that we find all the best stories mirrored in Scripture or Shakespeare.

Humans don’t change, and if humans don’t change, then—ipso facto—villains don’t change.

The entitled trust fund baby can genuinely believe they are “better” than others. Yet, though they are deeply believe they are better than others, they simultaneously fear their days are numbered. Frequently, they know that while they are better than everyone else, they’re never “good enough” for the person (people) who matters.

Additionally, with villains like this, their pride becomes their Achille’s Heel. They so wrapped up in their agenda, they are blind. Because they are blind, they cannot help but fall.

And none of us (readers) mind if they’re given a little push.

Schadenfreude & Catharsis

From Edgar Allen Poe’s The Telltale Heart to Kathryn Stockett’s The Help we audiences aren’t happy until there is some form of comeuppance.

***Ironically, in The Telltale Heart the MC is the villain. His own inborn sense that evil cannot go unpunished is the point of the story.

All stories are only as strong as their villains. If we are wishy washy on the villain, the rest of the book is bland. When we hold back on our villain, we inadvertently wreck our stakes.

There is something primal in all good stories. Humans have deep sympathy for the unavenged, the disappeared, and the disenfranchised. Every day, we see injustice and evil, and every day we know that the people causing much of this suffering will never be called to account.

Writers & Schadenfreude

Do you wield a little schadenfreude when you write?

I always find it a bit funny when readers ask if my villains are based on people I know because…DUH. YES. #SeriouslyDumbQuestion

Are they wholly patterned off ONE person? No. That would be copying not creating. They’re a collage of a million little events that made me…ME. And I get to enjoy a little bit if schadenfreude by casting them in my world .

*insert evil laughter*

It’s very therapeutic and cheaper than a defense attorney.

Do you see how just a touch of schadenfreude can also help with a “too perfect” character (maybe an MC)?

“Cutting someone down to size” is enjoyable in life and in fiction. Though we didn’t go into it today, can you see how schadenfreude can work in a redemption story, a love story, or wherever a character needs to grown and learn some humility?

I LOVE hearing from you!

Had you ever heard the term schadenfreude? Are you now committed to now finding ways to work this word into everyday conversation? Do you enjoy books and movies that deal out at least a little revenge?

Am I the only person who revels when a hidden cop pulls over a reckless driver?

Thoughts? Opinions? Favorite tales of schadenfreude?

And remember, my perennial author branding book, Rise of the Machines: Human Authors in a Digital World and my mystery thriller The Devil’s Dance are both on sale on Kindle right now for only .99.

Whether it is comments, shares, sales, or reviews, these are the things that keep us content producers (and authors) going and able to keep delivering. I always appreciate your support and love being able to keep doing this for you!

The post Schadenfreude: Misfortune, Revenge, Justice & Catharsis appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

Audience. How can we connect to an audience (readers) who will love our stories enough to buy, support and spread the word? This is the ever-present challenge on every author’s mind.

If it isn’t, then it should be.

The post before last, we had a big group hug and sang a little digital kumbayah in my post Help! I’m Having a Mid-Write Crisis! We need a pep talk/reality check every now and then to keep going because we are creative professionals. Many of us didn’t choose this life, it chose us. We aren’t going to be happy unless we are creating because it is part of who we are.

That said, if we are here for the long-haul, it is critical we identify, then connect with and curate our audience. You are not alone. Neither am I. Guess what?

We are also NOT special.

Whether is it art, music, theater, articles, fashion, jewelry, Netflix series, or novels, the hunt for the elusive audience has been a universal endeavor. No one has cracked the secret code for finding a guaranteed audience.

Okay no one except the people who write books called, “The Secret Code for Finding a Guaranteed Audience.”

Locating Our Audience

While locating our audience might seem rather daunting (it is), take comfort that it is also nothing NEW. Great news is what has been done before can be done…again.

Today, I am going to share a tactic I invented years ago and highlighted in my book Rise of the Machines: Human Authors in a Digital World. We are going to learn to do a Word Cloud.

Yes, I know this is a branding book that is eleven years old. I wrote the content to be what is called evergreen, meaning the principals I teach in it work no matter the age, time, or technology. Branding has never changed because humans don’t change.

Don’t believe me? Look at a pyramid then check out Instagram, Facebook, TikTok….

Lotsa CATS.

This is why RoM was all about understanding people. How to identify what they like, hate, love, loathe, are likely to share? It is NOT “The Secret Code for Finding a Guaranteed Audience” but it is possibly the “I Did All the Dumb Stuff So You Don’t Have To.”

While I can never guarantee anything, I can remarkably improve your odds.

Today, I am not going to talk about our product (the books). What I want to do is, hopefully, help y’all think about branding, platform and audience in a fresh way. This means we are ONLY going to do the initial step. If we want to locate our audience, seems only logical we figure out a way to recognize our people when we see them and vice versa.

Identifying Our Audience

This might be a silly example, but before I married and became a mom, I was the auntie to a bunch of nephews, godchildren and all their friends. Though I loathe crowds with the power of a thousand suns, I loved being “Cool Auntie” even more. So, quite often, I’d take a whole gaggle of little kids to theme parks like Six Flags, Disney, the Fort Worth Zoo, whatever.

To keep me sane, we would all dress in some super bright identical color so that I could easily find them, and they could easily find me.

Believe it or not, this is similar to how all humans bond (all animals, actually). We like to find our people. Someone posts a funny meme, or wears an obscure band tee, or quotes some cult classic movie and, Did we just become best friends?

When it comes to marketing for books, you cannot approach it like you are selling toilet paper. Why? Who is NOT using toilet paper? All the ads, coupons and sales are meant to appeal to a vast group of people who’d already planned on buying toilet paper. Books, weirdly enough, are a totally different beast that demand a unique approach.

For brevity’s sake, I explain this more in:

Branding & Attention: Busy Brains in a Busy World

Before we expand on this, I just need to lay a leeetle more groundwork. I promise. It’s critical.

Getting Tribal

Remember the time that all those people who brushed their teeth with Crest mocked the Colgate users on Facebook? Or the folks who preferred Bounty paper towels memed the HELL out of those who bought off-brand on X? What about that time the YouTube video about Listerine users went viral?

Listed among the things that never happened and never will.

WHY?

In sales there are 2 kinds of purchases, low consideration and high-consideration. Low-consideration is like TP, paper towels, toothpaste, mouthwash, etc. Those marketing these products aren’t fundamentally trying to ingrain a new behavior in their customers. This is why price points, marketing and coupons work for low-consideration products.

High-consideration are a totally different beast. When it comes to a high-consideration purchase, we humans get positively TRIBAL.

Mac users versus Microsoft? Mustang versus Corvette? Louis Vuitton versus Chanel? Android versus iPhone?

Notice the Differences?

First of all, these products usually are VERY expensive. A cheap Walmart purse will carry my crap just as well as a Louis Vuitton. Notice, though that LV never holds a BOGO sale? Tiffany’s never has a guy dressed as a gorilla twirling a sign to get people in the store.

Why?

They don’t need to.

Want to start a fight? Tell an Android user your iPhone is so much better (or vice versa). Challenge your souped up Honda against a Mustang. Get a diehard Nike junkie to wear Adidas drip. Tell Dallas Cowboys fans they aren’t going to the Super Bo…never mind.

That’s just being mean.

***But Dallas Cowboys fans will wear the jerseys anyway, right?

Y’all get the gist.

How do books fit into this?

Sadly, roughly 93% of the literate population, if asked to rank “things they’d love to do in their spare time,” would rank reading a book down below doing their taxes and getting their teeth cleaned…at the same time.

As writers, we have to acknowledge that while our book might be cheaper than a tube of toothpaste, it costs what people have less and less of.

TIME.

We are asking people to part with money they don’t have to do an activity they believe they will hate for an average of 12-15 hours they don’t have…and pay money to do this AND tell others how awesome it is.

Easy peasy, right?

Yes, and no. If we are aware that traditional marketing never has and never will sell books, then we don’t wast precious time and money. When it comes to books, we have to tap into the power of the TRIBE.

Show me a runaway success series (in print, on screen or both) and I will show you a rabid tribe ready to devour all things related: Harry Potter, Twilight, 50 Shades, Squid Games. Game of Thrones, The Last Airbender, Hunger Games, etc.

Audience: Who Are We Writing FOR?

Now that I set all this up, hopefully this exercise will make more sense to you. Because I am pretty sure you’d love your future audience to argue over who’s your best character, maybe dress like them, buy merch, argue over who should have ended up a couple, etc. Right? Which people DO.

Hang around Dr. Who fans for 30…okay 15 seconds.

Now that you know what a tribe is and why you need one, how do you locate them? This is the technique I mentioned that is in my book.

I have never before blogged on this.

Get out a piece of paper and hand write this exercise. I want to think about yourself. Pretend you are a jar of pasta sauce and we are listing the ingredients that make you, YOU. Add in favorite books, movies, seasons, colors, hobbies, songs, sensory phrases. Just word barf onto the page (not in neat columns).

The more words the better.

I am limiting here because I just need to do enough to make my point. Also, once you “finish” the cloud, keep adding to it. Heck, have friends and family help out, since they see aspects of you that you might not.

I am going to do three different examples to show you my point.

Author A

Science-fiction junkie, twisted sense of humor, Dune, Anime, Manga, graphic art, first-person shooter games, XBox, zombies, cheesy horror flicks, Army of Darkness, Fight Club, all things Mel Brooks, British comedy, Monty Python, Balls of Fury, Dodgeball, martial arts, Kung Fu movies, favorite holiday is Halloween, haunted houses, live in smartass t-shirts, Sabaton, heavy metal, high fantasy, Dungeons and Dragons, World of Warcraft, paintball with my friends, live music, off roading, microbreweries, building models, Ancient Aliens, no such thing as bad pizza, cat person, take in too many strays, Dr. Who, hate sports unless it’s jousting, Renaissance Festivals, ComiCon, DC, Marvel, Suicide Squad, HALO, Borderlands, live on energy drinks, all-night gaming, Squid Games, George R.R. Martin, Stephen King, Dean Koontz, Shogun, Jurassic Park, creating badass costumes, serial killer podcasts, love the smell of autumn bonfires, way too many hobbies, never organized, adulting sucks, only cookbook I use is my Beetlejuice Cookbook

Author B

Believe in love at first sight, Hallmark channel, bubble baths, wine-tasting, retail therapy, gluten free, chocolate everything, baking, Instagram, TikTok, live in the gym, all things fitness, shoes and more shoes, makeovers, Christmas, decorating for the holidays, cooking big fancy meals for my family, crochet, knitting, adult coloring books to de-stress, hosting parties so can dress up, jazz, Michael Buble, Christmas carols, singing in the shower, smell of fresh flowers, taste of hot chocolate chip cookies, gardening, planting flowers in spring, watching the Westminster dog show, Pomeranians, practicing French because no sexier language, new body lotion, expensive perfumes, essential oils, love stories, movies that make me cry, Joy Luck Club movie and book, hate horror or anything gross, love a happy ending, wrapping Christmas packages, Bridget Jones Diary movie and book, Liane Moriarty, home improvement shows, Lifestyle podcasts, organizing junkie, color-code everything, hate a mess but kids so it is a happy mess

Author C

Voracious reader, love history, prefer in depth memoirs, British History, History of the Roman Empire, read all the Greek philosophers, Epictitus, Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas, Augustine, speak several languages, taught myself Mandarin for fun, member of the Japanese Club in my city, volunteer as a docent at the art museum, recently took up sculpting, love making pottery, watercolor, Japanese Gardens, Japanese Festival in the Spring, Shakespeare in the Park, hot yoga, making my own sushi, vegan, love the big city, museums, subways, Central Park in Fall, Tai Chi, prefer classical music, NPR, history podcasts, cycling, don’t own a car, built a totally green house out of all reused materials, minimalist, love Swedish furniture, run marathons, read the NYT, collect all the Pulitzer winning novels, foreign films, hate profanity, love etymology, not a fan of holidays but enjoy food festivals, watch shows about exotic cooking, inhale history documentaries when I watch television but usually I don’t, smell of pavement in summer after a rain

Profiling the Audience

Okay so I just gave you profiles for three very different “authors.” What else did I give you? The most accurate picture of their audience humanly possible. Look at that cloud and you will see their potential audience (readers) in sharp relief.

Using a little bit of logic, I am pretty sure that Author A isn’t trying to win a Pulitzer with his literary novel featuring rogue samurai. Author C probably isn’t writing science fiction with loads of chainsaws and smart ass kitschy lines. Author B isn’t going to have profanity or violence.

Not to mention that—with Author B—everyone is going to get a happily ever after, whereas I don’t trust Author A not to turn everyone into zombies or Author C not to end the book with a tragic, but noble suicide/sacrifice for the greater good.

Notice that while they all share certain things in common (all writers, all love to read, all enjoy food, all listen to podcasts, all have creative hobbies, all enjoy animals) these authors are NOT IN COMPETITION…at all.

Even if there is some crossover, books are not so cost-prohibitive people cannot buy more than one (unlike a sports car). For the record, many of the items from all three clouds are ME.

Yes, I know. My humor get any darker and NASA gonna be studying it. But I also love cooking, crocheting, and primarily watch documentaries (and horror).

But I am not for everyone.

It is okay to be an oddball. A pattern will still emerge. That pattern is your people.

Trust me.

That is for another post, though.

Find Your Tribe So You Can Connect to YOUR Audience

It is really easy to get overwhelmed in the digital age of publishing. Part of WHY we get overwhelmed is because are trying to reach everyone. We don’t want to reach everyone because we cannot possibly please everyone. Everyone is not our audience.

Not everyone loves my blog, or my writing style or my tacky memes or even me. *clutches pearls* I KNOW! CRAZY TALK! #Philistines

In all seriousness, I “get” that I am in-your-face-salty and my blogs are LONG. Why? Because I am in-your-face-salty and suck at being brief in life and on the page.

Duh.

Thing is, though, people who like my blogs (audience) also generally like my fiction, even if the genre isn’t their usual forte. If you read The Devil’s Dance, it is no shock I wrote it. Pick up a copy of WTH Did I Just Read? 13 short stories of the Hitchcock-ian variety, and I bet you can pick out which stories I wrote.

Why? Because I cannot create anything without leaving my unique fingerprints on my work. Neither can you.

Writers write from who we are (or even who we long to be). It is why we kinda freak the Normies out.

Tribes Make Markets Manageable

Today, we aren’t going to go into any deeper detail because today is all about figuring out who exactly you are writing FOR. Even if you are writing non-fiction self-help books, I hope you can see how each of these profiles offer a sense of style, tone and voice.

The Navy S.E.A.L self improvement book “Extreme Ownership” has a vastly different tone than Rachel Hollis’s “Girl Wash Your Face” and THANK GOD because a world where Jocko Willink is talking like Rachel Hollis is a parallel dimension that should not exist outside of a Rom-Com.

Jocko Willink isn’t getting up at 0330, checking in on X, and then crushing the weights with super sets with overwhelmed moms trying to fit back into pre-baby clothing. He also isn’t giving his audience tips on how to make the perfect holiday basalmic vinegar or get rust stains out of baby clothes.

Though I seriously just cracked myself up.

Jocko, please don’t kill me.

Jocko Willink and Rachel Hollis, while both self-improvement experts, are not even in the same galaxy when it comes to finding their respective audience. If they aren’t competing for the same audience, why would we?

They appreciate the type of person most likely to benefit from/enjoy their content and then the post and socialize accordingly.

Word Cloud and Audience

Once you have your word cloud, you’ll have a far better idea which social media platforms might be a better fit, what kind of content to post, and ways to connect with people who share those connection points in your cloud.

This will make social media a lot more fun for all involved. Each of my imaginary authors can post about the things they love and enjoy and that will attract others who love and enjoy similar things.

Additionally, the content in that cloud has a MUCH higher chance of being shared. The more people share our content, the more algorithms give us favor, meaning our posts will show up in more feeds (and they don’t even have to be directly following us).

I can post an ad about my book being on sale and maybe a couple people (out of pity or fondness) will share. But the nature of the content is that it dies on the vine.

Memes? Funny videos? Inspirational videos? Open-ended discussions where people can have fun and engage? People loooove sharing that stuff and that helps you grow your platform logarithmically instead of linearly.

Eventually you bond, you talk, you klatsche and create your tribe.

What Are Your Thoughts?

For anyone who cannot wait to know what you’ll DO with your word cloud, feel free to pick up a copy of Rise of the Machines. The book goes into a lot of the neuroscience behind WHY people like a brand or don’t. What is going on in the synapses that either makes a love connection or fizzles?

Technology changes, humans don’t.

If you DO write a word cloud, again, strive to make it as long as possible. Feel free to add to it. It should be a living document.

Y’all have any questions about the CLOUD? Anything I can clarify with a post?

I think the word cloud is a really fun exercise and ONLY FOR THE BOLD AND BRAVE, feel free to post your cloud in the comments and what genre(s) you write if you’d like to volunteer for medical experimentation to be an example of what we’ll be DOING with those clouds.

My other personalities only cooperate so far.

Think of it as a cool way for me to get attention comments and you guys to score some free consulting! Win-Win!

***Remember NOT a column. Do like my examples if you want to volunteer *smooch*

Oh, and iPhone is way better. Only serial killers prefer Android *runs away giggling*

The post How to Create YOUR Audience: Identify, Connect, Convert appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

Wounds matter in life and in fiction. We’ve all been hurt in some way and to some degree. Just goes with being human.

Admitting weakness, failure, mistakes, and flaws isn’t always easy. In fact, it can be downright terrifying for even the ‘strongest’ of us. It’s an especially daunting task in a world that idolizes something none of us will ever be…perfect.

Wounds are part of the human experience. When we understand the nature of wounds, our fiction becomes all the richer just by adding in these layers.

All genres and all stories require wounds. No wound and no story. Even The Little Engine That Could had self-esteem issues and a confidence problem .

Wounds provide friction vital for conflict. No conflict, no story. Conflict turns pages, sells books, and cultivates fans. Remember, last time, we discussed how the market is BEYOND GLUTTED with BAD STORIES? How can we possibly stand out in against millions of titles, when even the ROBOTS are competing?

No one wants literary meatloaf. Boring=DEATH

One tried and true way to stand apart is the ‘No, duh.’ Tell AMAZING stories. We MUST come up higher. Again, no one wants literary meatloaf. This said, one of the BIGGEST weaknesses I see as an editor is writers holding back. You cannot afford to be meh. Definitely not in fiction. Wounds are THE best way to sell a story and cultivate an audience, especially these days.

Which is fine, because we are all feeling a bit damaged lately—writers & readers—so it is wonderful to escape in a story where a) the characters are wounded, too b) we can relate and maybe work through our demons and drama and c) there is resolution (and maybe even a happily-ever after!).

The entire point of stories is a flawed character overcoming some internal issue (damage) in order to triumph over an external problem. It’s why readers read fiction.

Undamaged characters aren’t simply boring, but the audience won’t be able to relate with them. How can we empathize with someone who lacks a past? Who’s never made a mistake, has no regrets, or has lived a charmed and problem-free life?

Short answer? We can’t.

In fact, the more messed up a person (or character) is, often the more interesting they become. Give them a shameful past, enough secrets to stress out Homeland Security, and more skeletons in the closet then a royal family. Audiences LIKE messed up people because they are a) the same but different (usually) b) they are unpredictable c) they inject excitement/drama into the everyday.

Remember Fight Club? When we meet the narrator and MC, he is dull as dirt…until MARLA. Who makes TYLER DURDEN emerge. So even if your character is a Safe Susan or Dull Dave, toss a lunatic character (and their peaceful, quite lives) into a blender then hit HIGH and watch the FUN.

Suffice to say that, today we will talk some about craft, and next time I have some completely new content regarding how to build your platform, identify your readers then connect with them and build a thriving fan base. It is a topic I have kept solely for classes and conferences, so should be fun.

Moving on!

Wounds: Genre Dictates Damage

All this said, the wounds we (writers) create need to fit the genre because genre acts as a guideline for reader expectations. Our goal as authors should be to meet then exceed reader expectations.

Stories are all for the reader or should be, which is why genre constraints can be very helpful for writers.

No one expects a cozy cupcake mystery to explore the nature of evil. Readers who gravitate to this genre are wanting a lighter read and will resent us playing Dostoyevsky.

Conversely, if a reader is in the mood for a story that probes the depths of the human condition, they’re probably not picking up a novel about a cupcake baker who solves local crimes.

Many emerging writers often shy away from damaged characters and use genre as an excuse to avoid the uncomfortable. Big mistake.

A cozy cupcake mystery can give the reader the light entertainment she craves and also offer emotional resonance she needs…without being Crime, Punishment and Cupcakes (though that’s a killer title, LOL).

When we understand wounds better, it helps us cultivate layered characters who’ll make for page-turning stories, regardless of genre. Let’s look at some common sources for wounds.

Pain of Perfect

First, what is perfect? Good question. Humans all across time and in every culture idolize perfect (always have and always will) though what perfect is varies vastly and changes all the time.

Just take a moment to google female beauty standards across the ages and it’s easy to see how, while the world around us might change, people don’t.

We are still ridiculous.

The ancient Incas thought being cross-eyed was super sexy. RAWR. They often fitted infants with a plank between their eyes to artificially create this ‘natural’ beauty for those unlucky enough to be born with ‘normal’ eyes. Ancient Greece was hot for the unibrow.

From ideal body type to what constitutes success to what constitutes normal or abnormal is in constant flux, and is different everywhere. It even varies from household to household depending on culture, and you got it…wounds.

This is where writers can have a lot of fun creating mayhem in fiction.

Wounds: Pain of Falling Short

No matter what genre we write, a character failing to ‘live up to’ some ideal is gold.

Maybe your character has spent a lifetime being measured against the ‘perfect’ older sibling, and struggles with self-esteem. This character might flounder trying to create his/her own distinct identity.

Or flip it.

What if the character happens to be the ‘perfect’ older sibling? This character didn’t ask for family or outsiders to pick on his or her younger sibling for not being as smart, talented, pretty, ambitious, etc.

This character never asked to be the standard unit of measurement to judge another human being. How much guilt might come with that? Think of the pressure or even the fear of being exposed as a ‘fraud’?

Also, we have another ‘person’ who lacks a distinctive identity. While we have two very different ‘people’ both characters are defined in relation to the other.

Outsiders have denied agency to both. It’s amazing how something as simple as birth order can create a wound that drives characters and their decisions (good and bad). And notice how this works no matter the genre. From pulp science fiction to an epic Joe Abercrombie A Little Hatred high fantasy (mixed with a smidge of steampunk), this formula WORKS.

Retell an old story using just this framework as a mental exercise, and you’ll see what I mean.

How does Little Red Riding Hood change if she has an older sister who usually does the deliveries to Grandma? What if the Three Little Pigs are actually embroiled in a desperate war of sibling rivalry? Who are they building the houses to impress? How would Sleeping Beauty feel from the POV of the illegitimate and (TRUE) first daughter of the king, condemned to always be in the shadow of the beautiful, cursed little sister?

Just LOOK at how fun these old worn out stories become with a fresh new spin! Take all those battered, broken parts the world likes to throw away and refashion them into something powerful.

We see this sort of sibling wound explored in everything from The Joy Luck Club (literary fiction) to Game of Thrones (epic high fantasy) to one out of every three Hallmark movies .

Wounds & the Diseased Family Tree

Since we’ve all managed to survive a pandemic, many of us recall what it was like to be trapped in close quarters with loved ones. How we might have even become more hyperaware of old wounds that hadn’t healed at all or had healed improperly.

BOOM!

We touched a bit on family damage a moment ago in regards to ‘perfection.’ Family damage can come in many forms.

Joe Hill’s Heart-Shaped Box does a brilliant job of exploring the ‘anti-goal’ which is a common fruit of the diseased family tree.

Judas Coyne is a famous rockstar, wealthy beyond imagination who has everything (including a lot of emotional baggage). Hate, anger and resentment fueled his incredible success, yet false guilt and profound shame keep him from enjoying any of it. A vengeful ghost determined to destroy him body and soul might be the only thing with the power to liberate Coyne from his emotional bondage.

Sometimes the diseased family tree is not as obvious. Often, parents believe they’re giving their children the best, but are actually deluded about the nature of their motives….

Rich Girl Problems

In The Luckiest Girl Alive, TifAni’s mom is superficial, materialistic, and self-absorbed. Her father is an emotionally absentee ghost who resents his life. Her mother pushes for TifAni to attend an elite prep school to give her daughter all the opportunities she missed (code for ‘marry real money’). Dad doesn’t have the spine to stand up and say ‘no.’

Both parents are too self-centered to realize TifAni in that school is a ticking bomb.

Of course, not every character needs to grow up in Season Ten of The Jerry Springer Show in order to take on some damage. The road to therapy is paved with good intentions.

Parents are human, too.

What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty explores how the best of intentions can poison everything.

Life Wounds All

Life has 100% fatality rate. No one gets out alive. Also we’re all going to get hurt somewhere by someone (and hurt others, too). Thing is, life is all…pointy.

If family doesn’t make us bleed, then school, peers, romantic interests, work colleagues, social media, well-meaning editors, book reviews, or plain bad luck will.

I know. I missed my calling writing inspirational cards .

Why am I talking about all this? Because of what we JUST talked about. Writers have more ‘competition’ than any other time in human history. With no gatekeepers, discoverability is a nightmare. There are a gazillion choices for books and most of them (like cable channels) are a waste of what little free time we have.

More is Not Always Better

From movies to television to books, audiences are deluged with tired tropes, boringly predictable plots and characters with the emotional depth of a goldfish. We can see this ‘glut of meh’ as a problem or use it for our advantage.

If we know why readers read, what they want, then we can work hard on what matters.

Readers long for emotional connection and stories that help them deal with pain, ease their pain or maybe even solve/release their pain. They want hope that messed up people overcome big problems in spite of, or perhaps because of, wounds and flaws.

Audiences yearn to believe that, on the other side of their problems, there is joy, peace, true love, freedom, fulfillment, healing, understanding, wholeness!

Wounds are healed and victory sealed. Who doesn’t want more of THAT?

What Are Your Thoughts?

Getting tired of the same old same old? From Hollywood to books it feels like it’s just the same stuff over and over. I get giddy when I discover something truly excellent. Some of my best therapy and a-ha moments have come from fiction.

What about you?

I love hearing from you!

What are your thoughts? We need to write the stories that change the world because, if one looks back? That’s what writers do. The world is ailing and our stories provide the medicine, if not the cure.

Global politics, the economy, work, one crisis after another! The world needs an escape. WE NEED AN ESCAPE. So can you think of ways to put that imagination to use in ways that will help those Normies out there cracking up?

What are some ways that you can reimagine wounds? Have you had to narrow of a definition? Are there some ways you can think of to delve deeper than the surface? Who are some of your favorite wounded characters from the page and/or the screen?

The post Wounds & Characters: The Damaged REBORN! appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

Meltdowns, frequently referred to as “autistic meltdowns” actually happen all along the ND (neurodivergent) spectrum, meaning ADD and ADHD people are certainly not immune. And, if you read my last post Neurodivergent Authors: Not Lazy or “Broken,” I expressed my fairly educated hypothesis/concern that many creative professionals likely fall somewhere along the ASD spectrum.

What does this mean?

Probably a lot of folks who read this blog have spent years attributing their irritability, stress, and possibly even full on implosions/tantrums solely to being introverts, unaware there are other neurological factors in play.

Factors, that, for the record, are completely manageable once we become aware of them.

For years, I had people around me accuse me of having an anger problem. While there were certainly times in my life this might have been applicable (I AM human), it didn’t always apply.

I’d be fine, fine, fine, less fine, not fine, red-lining then BOOM!

Often it might begin as generalized anxiety/irritability then would shift into me getting curt and (seemingly out of nowhere) BOOM! Crying, hysterical, threatening to live in my blanket fort forever and ever and everyone sucked eggs and needed to leave me alone lest I leap off a water tower.

What? I’m a writer. We can be dramatic. And they ARE called “meltdowns” not “fluffy kitten pillow-downs.”

***Though NOT ALL ND people have the same KIND of meltdowns. Hubby is autistic and he just shuts down. Seriously. Ctrl Alt Delete doesn’t even work. He says nothing, does nothing and just goes into a mental cave that even DYNAMITE doesn’t work on.

Understand Introversion vs. Extroversion

Before we go any further, I would like to clarify a point because I see this misused all the time and it makes my left eye twitch. Social anxiety is NOT the same as introversion.

The ONLY difference between an introvert and an extrovert is how/where you gain/lose energy.

PERIOD.

If you need to be around people to charge your emotional batteries and being alone too much drains you? Then you are an extrovert. And likely an author who really LOVES writing in bustling coffee shops #KillMeNow.

Conversely, if you require alone time to recharge and being around people drains you, then you are an introvert. Whenever I speak at a conference I am probably one of the most high-energy speakers you’ll ever see present. I love people, enjoy getting and remembering everyone’s names, want to hear all about your life, hopes, dreams, stories, setbacks, and brownie recipes.

YET…

Whenever I get home, I have to slip into something more comfortable…like a COMA.

There are people with severe social anxiety who love to hang out in mosh pits or stand with a drink in a crowd of five hundred people listening to live music.

And, as I just mentioned, there are people like me who never met a stranger and could talk the ear off a brass monkey…but we NEED downtime lest we crash.

Most people (who are not locked up in an institution) are actually ambiverts. It is pretty rare to have a pure extrovert or introvert.

For more on this, go to: Myth-Busting—The Real Difference Between Introverts & Extroverts & Meet the Ambivert

Meltdowns & Are You REALLY an Introvert?

Again, most people will be some mixture of introvert and extrovert. The far ends of the bell curve usually cannot function in society. This said, if you go back to my last post I talked about autism.

To reiterate, “If you have met one autistic person, you have met ONE autistic person.”

To grossly oversimplify autism, it is a sensory processing disorder. For me, the world is brighter, louder, itchier, yuckier and far more chaotic than it is for “normal” people (a.k.a. Neurotypical or NT). NT people don’t have a fit wearing a headband, or go bananas because there…is….a…tag on their shirt…that…KILL IT WITH FIRE!

The sheer levels of energy it takes for us ND people to “appear” normal could power a small city. This is why, to a degree, I am all for CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy). I “get” that the world cannot always accommodate me and I have to learn some workarounds and to TRY to fit in the best I can.

That said? The rest of the world can learn some compassion, too.

Hey, we did it with left-handed people! Just give them a special notebook instead of beating them with rulers and telling them they were demon spawn.

Evolve.

Where was I?

Yes, the world is a very over-stimulating place for ND people. Meaning, we “might” be extroverts and it is just the fluorescent lights, the traffic noise, the constant binging on the phones, the noises on the computers, the AC going on and off and on and off and WHAT IS WITH THAT GUY WITH THE LEAF BLOWER?

So, just a thought. You might be an introvert, might not. Doesn’t really matter after you read all of this anyway.

Meltdowns: What is Going ON?

Back when I struggled with what I didn’t know at the time were autistic meltdowns, I was VERY bad about being self-aware of a) how stimulated/overstimulated I was b) how tired/overworked I was and c) that I needed to do better pre-planning.

When I found out about autistic meltdowns, I also uncovered The Spoon Theory.

Anyone who’s followed me any length of time knows that I am a giver. I LOVE to give. I’ll take a call, run an errand, help a friend, teach a class, crochet for the needy. You name it? SIGN…ME…UP.

Or not.

This could just be me (and I also can blame the ADHD and OCD) but I tend to have terrible self-awareness. Why? Because I am paying SO MUCH ATTENTION to the world around me.

Social cues? What are those?

I have to put so much energy into reading the room and “fitting in” that all my energy can end up directed outwards.

Y’all have NO IDEA how many sticky notes are fluttering inside my head.

Kristen, let other people talk.

Take turns…wait for it….wait for it….

LISTEN to what they are saying to you.

Where is that leaf blower noise coming from?

Don’t say the thing everyone probably thinking but will get you in trouble (again).

Is that joke appropriate, or a good way to get a visit from HR?

Why did I HAVE to wear HAIR CLIPS? I can feel my BRAIN.

Use your hands to gesture so you don’t look like a robot.

BACK UP! ABORT! Too much hands! ABORT!

Her outfit is nice but not nearly as nice as the one she wore three weeks ago. It was blue and I normally don’t like blue….

Kristen, let them leave. Make friends don’t take hostages.

What was the topic? FOCUS.

Don’t be weird. Don’t be weird. Don—DANG IT! You HAD to talk about the Black Plague, didn’t you?

Maybe no one here can relate, but you can write characters who DO.

Only So Many Fu-Spoons to Give

Moving on…

Though obviously I recommend the link above, The Spoon Theory applies to anyone who is dealing with chronic pain, a chronic illness, dealing with grief/loss, or who might have sensory issues like those of us in the Special Unique Snowflake Fruit Salad that is ASD.

To give you the gist, we only have so many spoons of energy and it is wise for us to a) plan how to use them b) be aware when we are using them and c) take time to get away to refill them.

For instance, I can be accused of a lot of things, but lazy is not one of those things. When I took a good look at my Things To Do List? Let’s just say it or I was just a little bit…insane.

Since I have worked from home for over 20 years, I had (and still have) zero idea what might be “normal,” let’s just say “normal” not my wheelhouse.

Those who know me will tell you I can be mostly dead and will push through anyway (frequently to the detriment of my health). At least this was the case until recently.

Before I realized what a flaming idiot how foolish I was being, I felt I just needed more willpower. I had no concept that not only was my list too long, and my standards to high, but that I needed to chill…the hell…OUT.

I was having meltdowns because I struggle with admitting I even have limitations, let alone living within them. The ADHD means I use lists and timers to stay on task and the OCD tells me I must do all the things…perfectly.

But, I am improving.

Example One (LIFE):

Yesterday, I recruited Spawn (14 year-old son) to help me detail the bathrooms. I had to clean out 10+ years of detritus that had collected under and in cabinets because the clutter was wrecking my ability to quickly and easily keep things clean and organized.

***For the record, the picture above is NOT my bathroom, merely how my demented/perfectionist mind THINKS my bathroom looks.

Anyway…

Not only did I ask for help (WINNING!) but I also stopped after the bathrooms. Normally, my ADHD self would have had to put something into the closet, seen THAT was a mess, pulled all of THAT out and…BOOM!

Meltdown.

As I say often about writing:

Perfect is the enemy of the finished.

I’m learning that, if I wish to go more granular on my organizing/cleaning, I can. On another day. Trust me, the junk will still be there. And, if I pace myself, I can do a little every day and keep that junk from having babies.

Example Two (WORK):

Though I didn’t yet have an official diagnosis, back in May when I went to speak in Boise, ID, I operated off the idea that I was, in fact, ND.

My presentations often are slotted at either the beginning of the day or the end of the day. The reason? I put off so much energy, I get people HOPPED UP! I make people laugh and move and participate and it is a lot of fun.

That said, I attend other speakers’ presentations out of professional courtesy, and also because I don’t know everything.

I know! *shock face*

Anyway, on Day 2 of the conference, I’d been traveling and walking and speaking and paying attention and then lunchtime came. My presentation was at like 2:00 (when everyone needs a NAP, me included).

I walked all the way from the conference center to the bustling restaurant before it hit me.

I was exhausted.

Any other conference, I would have ignored all my sensors flashing RED, gone in and socialized with all the writers, despite the crowds, noise and lights.

***Refer to visual representation of Kristen in image above.

This time? I did what I’d never done before and told Troy Lambert (my friend and co-author of our anthology WTH Did I Just READ?) I needed a “time out.” I walked all the way BACK to the conference center then sat alone in my noise canceling headphones and regrouped.

This was the ONLY conference in 15 years that I made it home perfectly healthy. Since I kept a better eye on my energy levels, I didn’t tank myself.

Also, when everything that could go wrong DID go wrong in my presentation (with the technology)? I held it together and was able to stick-and-move. Had I not recharged, it would have been a disaster.

Meltdowns: Other Issues

We might be having meltdowns because we’re overstimulated, overtired, etc. etc. Yet, here is another insidious problem we might have a harder time dealing with.

Learn to set boundaries and enforce them.

I tend to be far too accommodating for my own good. I’ll set a boundary then, when others stomp all over it, I tell them it’s okay.

No, it isn’t.

When I do that, not only am I saying my time/space/boundaries have no meaning and it is okay to walk all over me, but I am ALSO confusing those around me with mixed messages.

Say, I need to write and I tell my family to leave me be until noon. They keep walking in and out and asking for things and for me to make nibblies and to ask me a question and I am all, “No, it’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine, it’s….

*Kristen grows 25 feet, morphing into LAMBZILLA*

I WILL THROW YOU IN THE ENDLESS PIT OF LEGOS AND SUFFERING IF YOU INTERRUPT ME ONE MORE TIME!

Unfair to me, and confusing and unkind to others.

And, if you’re ND, then wobbly boundaries almost guarantees regular meltdowns.

Meltdowns and the Holidays

Tis the Season to Go Psycho…

The world is far more fast-paced than ever in human history. It is also unsustainable, but that is another post. In the meantime—until SkyNet comes for us—we are going to have to be intentional.

I still have a day job writing and editing. I’m also a housewife who does all the shopping, cooking and cleaning. Additionally, I homeschool a 9th grader. If Santa Claus came down my chimney any other year I might have set his beard on fire.

Spoooons.

This year, now that I know better? I am only putting out so many decorations, only giving so many gifts, and instead of singing Fa-La-La-La La? I’m saying NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NO, NOOOOO!

Sort and prioritize. These are the SUPER important things and worthy of spoons. This stuff? A maybe. That stuff? Only if I have enough spoons.

Lest I end up hiding in a festive blanket fort weeping, washing down raw sugar cookie dough and sprinkles with a bottle of real eggnog…

What are Your Thoughts on Meltdowns?

Meltdowns…not just for toddlers anymore. Did you understand what it really means to be an introvert/extrovert? Were you possibly blaming a bit too much on being an introvert? Do you SUCK at being self-aware/doing self-care?

If you do have meltdowns, are yours the thermo-nuclear-everyone-get-under-that-50s-school-desk kind? Or are you like my husband and just kind of short-circuit and need time to reboot? Maybe somewhere in between?

Have you ever heard of The Spoon Theory? Any other suggestions, thoughts, ideas?

Here is a video from a gal I watched before going through the official diagnosis process. Obviously not all ND people are the same, but what she talked about SO SPOKE to me (enough to where I made sure to get professionally tested).

Maybe this will help you or someone you love, OR hey we need more ND characters so here is a peek inside our heads…

The post Meltdowns: Chaos & the Neurodivergent Author appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

Redemption is a much more prolific theme than most might realize.

Whether it is a fun, romantic Helen Fielding (Bridget Jones Diary), a gritty Cormac McCarthy (The Road) or a therapy-inducing Ken Follett (Pillars of the Earth), they hold one common thread.

Redemption.

Will Bridget finally see the truth of herself—that she’s shallow—before she commits to loving the wrong man?

In a world gone mad, can the actions of a Man and a Boy redeem faith in humanity?

In a world of unspeakable violence and savagery, will justice ever be served? Is Tom Builder—a man who abandons his newborn by his wife’s grave—worthy of redemption?

Whether the story is a short cozy romance or an epically long historical, we still see this embedded desire that even bad people deserve another chance. I believe this is a good thing, and demonstrates that hope springs eternal with us humans.

Thus, today, we’ll explore the notion if all characters can be saved? Should they be? And how far can we push the line before readers no longer care? What does the undertone of redemption add to story and what do we risk losing without it?

***Feel free to skim for what applies to you. My blogs are long, but I guarantee you they are a LOT shorter than the thousands of pages of reading I use to boil down for this “bone broth.” Moving on….

Flawed Characters ALL Require Redemption

This weekend, Spawn and I (horror junkies that we are) watched Emesis Blue on YouTube. Overall, enjoyable. Some INCREDIBLE imagery. Very well executed. But, since once an editor always an editor, it is almost impossible for me not to find SOMETHING that could have been done a bit better.

So far I have only discovered about 5 perfect books in the thousands I have read that I wouldn’t change a word (FYI: None are mine). Same with movies.

The ONLY thing I could pick on was the film didn’t make it really clear WHO I needed to “root” for. Horror can, like literary, be a genre that is ALL BAD PEOPLE. You literally find yourself simply siding with the least bad, bad guy…which is fine.

But do you want your story to be “okay” or “fine” or “Good enough”? Or do you want it to go to that next level?

This is where character arc can be a game-changer. When I mention “redemption” it implies the character needs to learn, change, grow or evolve in some way.

When characters are “too perfect” or the converse “too horrible/stupid to live” the story can stall. This isn’t the 1950s. Shock value and BIG THINGS HAPPENING are okay, but they’re sorely lacking when it comes to hooking an audience for the long-haul.

We can have the most amazing writing, prose, setting, and even clever plot, but if readers don’t CARE about the characters, they grow easily bored. Bad things need to happen but….

BAD THINGS Alone are NOT Conflict

Conflict is simple. Two people with different levels of POWER wanting their own thing…collide.

That is it. Simple, but not easy.

In police procedurals, the BBT (Big Boss Troublemaker) is the CORE ANTAGONIST responsible for creating the story problem in need of solving by THE END. Often it is a killer, criminal, thug, or someone breaking the law in some way.

BUT….

Where the MC will often experience the MOST pushback will be from those closest. Every scene needs an antagonist. We need to make the audience worry. If everything is too happy-dappy and everything is sunshine and rainbows, that is not a novel. It is an overly long Hallmark card.

Back to the police procedural and uneven power.

Detective Hardnose WANTS to hunt down KILLER.

Police Chief Blowhard WANTS to win an election.

Detective Hardnose’s methods are unorthodox because that is only way to catch the killer BUT Chief Blowhard is getting bad press. HE wants the killer caught…but with kid gloves that don’t upset voters.

See the power imbalance? Detective Hardnose STILL needs to stop a killer. He STILL knows conventional policing won’t work, BUT he needs to use his skills and brain to figure out a workaround.

Whether it is conflict with a superior officer, Internal Affairs, the Feds, meddling politicians, or even the detective’s own FAMILY…note the power struggle. THIS is what turns pages.

CAN the detective catch the killer, please his boss, keep his badge and maintain his marriage and relationship with his kids?

We WORRY and WORRY IS FICTION GOLD. Regardless the genre, your reader needs to worry every single page all the way until THE END.

An EVEN BIGGER KAIJU!

There is a great little flick called Pacific Rim. And forgive me because it will seem like I am contradicting myself, but bear with me. Pacific Rim is a fantastic flick for young boys. I grew up on anime (Voltron, Transformers, Robotech, etc.) so it was a fabulous throwback to that.

This said….

The entire plot is basically some inter-dimensional rift has opened up along the—you guessed it—the Pacific Rim, where giant monsters wriggle through to unleash mass destruction on large cities (popular back when we still found CGI fascinating).

Mankind creates basically giant robot suits to battle Godzilla-esque creatures.

The ENTIRE plot is really just…a BIGGER KAIJU! Then a BIGGER KAIJU! And, in a totally unexpected plot twist…the BIGGEST KAIJU EVER! (Until the next movie).

That is it.

And if you’re writing campy stories/movies that appeal to predominantly young boys, teen boys and/or middle aged women with the sense of humor and tastes of a 9th grade boy…FABULOUS.

LOVE SHARKNADO! Almost as much at Lavalantula.

But these are B-movies people enjoy for the precise reason they are so wonderfully BAD. I bet you most folks couldn’t NAME a single character from any of these kinds of movies. We also really never worry in any of these “stories.”

When it comes to BOOKS? Here’s the problem.

Most People Don’t Like to Read

It is an old post but a lot of my content is evergreen. Check out Why Traditional Marketing Doesn’t Sell Books for a more in depth breakdown. Everything in that post from 2011 is true today. Actually much MORE SO since we have so many other mediums of entertainment all clamoring for our attention.

But, when surveyed, something like 94% of people admit that reading is something they want to do more of in theory, but never DO. If asked to list the top 10 or even 20 things they believe they’d like to do with their spare time…reading doesn’t make the list for MOST literate people.

That’s the “bad news.” The “great news” is people LOVE to read…they just don’t know it yet.

If you don’t believe me, how many people have you told you were a writer and the FIRST WORDS out of their mouth were, “Have you read 50 Shades of Grey?”

They might not read ANY OTHER BOOK, but “regular people” (code for “future readers”) are absolutely CULT-LIKE when they find a book (or series) they fall in love with. They’ll genuinely believe they still hate to read…but they love everything Harry Potter, Hunger Games, 50 Shades, etc.

They’ll practically have a SHRINE with all the hardbacks, the merch, the movies, etc.

What this means is we writers have to do better. We can’t hook like 1950s pulp novels that sold like hotcakes because what else would someone do on a long bus ride, in a waiting room, during bad weather, etc. What this ALSO means is that stuff that hooked 20 years ago, just will not work today. Apps and games and YouTube are low-hanging and shiner/easier fruit.

Readers are Narcissists

HUMANS are narcissists. Use that. Why do we (the nerdy readers who cannot FATHOM NOT loving books) get hooked on certain books or series? Usually, it is because we see something of ourselves. We cling onto particular characters because they reflect us in some way for good or bad. What we are, what we wish we weren’t, what we aspire to be.

This is why that redemption aspect is SUCH a game changer.

We cannot relate to super perfect people. In fact, there is a human psychological phenomenon referred to as Schadenfreude that explains exactly why we’re more prone to root against perfect people.

I get it sounds horrible, but back in the day of tabloids, what sold more copies? Super Hollywood Starlet with cellulite? Or Super Hollywood Starlet looking freakishly and inhumanely gorgeous?

Cellulite obviously.

It’s nice to nice to knock perfect people “down a peg,” WHY? Because it humanizes her. It wasn’t per se we wished anything horrible on her, only we couldn’t see her as one of “us” so long as she had unfathomable natural beauty, the perfect body, a gazillion dollars, and was even NICE!

***Feel free to insert whatever superstar/rockstar, etc.

We were fascinated not by “bad things happening to her” as much as realizing she was a person just like us.

So, if we KNOW humans are wired this way….

USE IT!

Make Characters NEED Redemption

Even if we go to the Hallmark movies, please appreciate that millions and millions of people love watching every year, especially at Christmas. We can easily see the human need for redemption. Hallmark (as formulaic as it is) still offers super perfect but FLAWED characters.

Obviously the plots are usually over the top because, while Hallmark might be formulaic, the formula WORKS.

Same with cocaine, FYI.

Even if the main love interest is the heir apparent to some tiny country no one’s heard of, something in him is missing/damaged/broken that only the love interest can fix. Is he too serious? Has he become unbalanced? All work and duty and no fun? Does he take his role for granted?

Same with the gal. Maybe she is a spunky assistant who’s pretty and clever and kind…but she is usually a hopeless klutz, is super insecure, is socially oblivious, is overshadowed by a sibling. Whatever. OR, she could be the one who is the “ice queen” who is all work and no fun.

Doesn’t matter.

It does mean your characters need to be their own worst enemies and the PLOT is all that can save them from themselves.

Redemption to Scale

The great part about thinking in terms of redemption (instead of “character arc”) is that it makes it a) practical and b) scalable.

Obviously if I am writing a cozy mystery, then an MC with a habit of cocaine and hookers is a poor choice. Instead? A hopeless busybody who’s meddling comes back to bite.

If, however, I am writing a gritty action thriller, then a well-meaning busybody is a poor choice. And cocaine and hookers for the win!

For those who want to do or even TRY NaNoWriMo (which I always recommend), this “redemption” idea will be important to keep you going for the long-haul.

I recommend starting with a NEW idea (especially if you struggle with finishing). Seems like bad advice, but bear with me. I’m going to offer you a new process to try.

Get your “idea” then whittle it into ONE SENTENCE.

What is your story ABOUT? I have a walk through here HOW to do this.

Pitch Your Story in ONE Sentence

Once you have that sentence, think about what would make your character emotionally intriguing? Sure, they’re a 100th degree blackbelt, know 15 languages, do parkour like Jackie Chan and all that is great…

But the more superlatives we add, oddly enough the less interesting the character becomes.

All those “bad@$$” qualities aren’t what make the character interesting. What makes them interesting is they have 100 superlative qualities but THIS FLAW lays them low.

Will They EVER Succeed?

Okay, so flaws. This is where we have to do some of the more delicate work in our craft. AGAIN, genre will inform this. Hallmark-style romance is NOT about hard-boiled terrible people doing terrible things to even more terrible people. Converse is true as well.

Y’all got that because you’re super smart.

With the lighter reads, we have to be careful we don’t make everyone too perfect. When it comes to other genres, this starts to scale.

On one end of the spectrum is Lee Child’s Jack Reacher. Former M.P. who lives off the grid for whatever reason and always seems to find trouble. His flaws? People skills are often terrible, he pisses off authority figures, and his personal life is…yeah.

The other side of the spectrum are your anti-heroes. They’re SO BAD but you cannot help rooting for them. Think Lestat in Interview with a Vampire.

So get your idea into ONE sentence then CAST appropriately. What does THIS story problem (plot) have that will serve as the crucible to refine that flaw?

The HBO Series True Blood did this phenomenally! Eric Northman is the oldest of the vampires and he’s lived SO LONG life has no meaning…until he falls for Sookie. BUT, his Viking/Vampire ways, while his greatest asset, also create the most problems.

With Redemption, Balance is KEY

This is where a LOT of intentional reading is your friend. You do not have to reinvent the wheel. The wheel works. And odds are, if you read enough, you’ll have enough pieces to create something wholly unique. The same but also totally NEW! Reading will also train you in certain techniques.

Back to balance.

We cannot write a book everyone loves. EVERYONE is not my audience or yours. I absolutely loved The Girl on the Train. The MC is a really, really bad alcoholic, thus an unreliable narrator. I had no problem with her, but she wasn’t for everyone.

Conversely, I read a “suspense/thriller” that was traditionally published and had a gazillion 5 star reviews…and the character was too dumb to live. I finished it because I am stubborn and I think we can often learn more from bad books than good.

It was as if the author had never read the genre and all I wanted to do was scream and throw the book…which I would have done except I read on my phone and that’s too expensive to break.

Proving my point that everyone is different.

How to Redeem the Seemingly Irredeemable

So for those who read the lighter genres, make sure to give them some relatable flaws. For everyone else….

Anti-heroes are difficult. There is a fine line we have to tread. We will not be able to make everyone happy. My new anthology WTH Did I Just Read? has a sampling of my writing. I LOVE anti-heroes and unreliable narrators. Will some love EVERY character in every story?

Duh, obviously *hair flip*

Kidding. Even I know that I might totally turn readers off on ALL of them or some of them or one of them.

If, however, you want a gritty character, tips for “redemption”….

1. Make them the lesser of evils.

Dr. Hannibal Lecter might be terrifying, but not nearly as terrifying (or reprehensible) as the men he takes down (Eg. Mason Verger).

2. Give them a glimmer of a characteristic that is deeply likable.

Jessica Knoll’s The Luckiest Girl Alive features Ani, who is a scheming, shallow, conniving “Mean Girl.” At first glance, she is a horrible human being. She’s vain, gold-digging, and will do almost anything to get ahead professionally. Yet, in one of the opening scenes, Ani is interviewing for the very coveted position as her intern at a super prestigious fashion magazine.

How does she choose? She takes the applicants for coffee downstairs at the little newsstand where a disfigured immigrant named Loretta works. When the stand first hired Loretta, people complained because she was unsightly (burn scars), spoke broken English, and had a bit of body odor.

ANI, however, noticed all the coffee was fresh, including the creamers (even the soy milk). The store was always spotless and the magazines were artfully displayed.

Ani not only notices what others do not, she JUDGES others on how they TREAT Loretta. The minute they whisper anything cruel or degrading, Ani blackballs them.

She is deliciously awful.

3. Make them sympathetic.

Yes, in The Girl on a Train, Rachel is a spiraling alcoholic…BUT when you learn what she survived and WHY she is using booze to cope, it “can” soften you enough to give her the benefit of the doubt hoping she’ll get her act together with the addiction.

Structure can also be your friend.

IF you struggle to make them sympathetic, then have another character who sees the good in them. This worked with Sookie and Eric.

I just finished listening to an audiobook that is among those elusive “perfect books” I mentioned earlier. Old Country is a ghost story/psychological suspense/horror that left ME shaking. I vacillated between I dreaded to read more, but also could not read FAST ENOUGH.

One of the reasons I LOVE the horror genre is it is the toughest genre to write well. For the story to work, you really kind of need characters to do dumb, counterintuitive or even self-destructive things.

How did Old Country pull this off without characters falling into unlikable/too stupid to live? There are two MC POVs, one the husband and the other the wife (a.k.a. the “Buddy Love” structure).

The husband is belligerent, stubborn to the point of ridiculousness, self-destructive, impulsive, etc, etc. which the story demands for plausibility and also for one HELL of a knockout ending.

We “get” he’s a combat veteran in the opening scene, so we already forgive A LOT.

But not everything…

THIS is where the author did a brilliant job by adding in the WIFE’S POV. Wives have a way of seeing in ways we cannot, in ways their husbands cannot. True in life and in fiction.

The wife serves as a foil. She’s a sort of an advocate there to tell us (the reader) as well as other characters that “this reaction was over the top, even for him.” Or that “something had to be terribly wrong because, while he definitely had an anger problem, he’d NEVER ONCE raised his voice like that, so he HAD to be TERRIFIED.”

The only thing I would caution here is that this partner character needs to serve the story more than just being there to “explain away” bad behavior.

But the cool thing is…they can explain away bad behavior. They can smooth the rough edges that might, otherwise turn a reader totally off our story.

Think Frodo and Samwise or Dr. Watson and Sherlock.

The “Buddy Love” structure is fantastic if you need to balance out a particularly irascible character. They can also help the other character arc because that character is just too blind/damaged to do it on their own.

Redemption is wonderful in life and it is fiction GOLD.

***Why else would we have rooted for SPIKE all those years in Buffy?

Redemption makes characters fascinating. They’re such a danger to themselves and others we wonder if they’ll ever get their act together. We want them to because if THEY can do it, so can we.

I LOVE Hearing from You!

What are your thoughts on redemption? Do you see how common this theme really is? Does it add that little extra je ne sais quoi to a story for you, too? Who are some characters you never thought could be redeemed? Are there others you wish HAD been redeemed?

To prove it and show my love, for the month of OCTOBER, everyone who leaves a comment, I will put your name in a hat.

***I actually have landed agents for people who’ve won this contest. Agents like me because I make their lives easier.

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 (and maybe even time with an agent).

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). People with superlative writing, I (with your permission) have been known to pass you onto an agent.

Anyway, I look forward to reading your comments and your writing!

The post Redemption: Can All Characters Be “Saved”? appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

Anti-villains are a type of character we haven’t discussed before. I’d almost venture to say that—while most of you have heard the term “anti-hero”—you might be a tad stumped on the term “anti-villain.”

*does mental gymnastics* *does them too close to curtains* *sets curtains ablaze*

Personally, I love learning about and teaching how to write amazing villains. Why? First of all, the hero (heroic party) is only as good as the opposition. Triumph in the face of ridiculously overwhelming odds?

Yes, please!

Yet, all that really has more to do with plot—stakes, goal, ticking clocks—as opposed to character. Why would we choose an anti-villain over a regular villain? Do we even need a villain? Are pants required?

***Sadly, yes, pants usually required.

Anti-Villain

To keep this simple, when we think of villains (in a default sense), it’s easy to conjure a “Black Hat” mustache-twirling caricature. You might be thinking, But Kristen, my villain has so much depth and suffering and, and…”

Hold on! I give extra credit for y’all at the end.

Last post, we talked about how to boil your entire book/series/story idea/TV pitch into ONE sentence.

Why is that important? When we boil our story down, we should be able to clearly see everyone’s GOALS, because goals are what make the critical difference here. Anti-villains can be very easily mistaken for anti-heroes (depending on how jaded one happens to be) and vice versa.

Anti-villains still have what the audience would consider an “evil” goal, but their motivations and WHY they want that goal is where the nuance comes in.

Case in Point:

My dear friend and talented thriller author Allison Brennan and I have had a long-standing debate. Allison insists Dr. Hannibal Lecter is a villain, whereas I claim Lecter is, in fact, an anti-hero (cuz he only offs people who kinda deserve it).

Don’t you judge me! Y’all all know you were cheering at the end when he called Clarice to tell here he “was having an old friend for dinner.”

I’ve just keep this long-standing debate going, largely, to tweak with my Lawful Good friend’s sense of right and wrong (I tend to have a Chaotic Neutral streak).

Yet, the truth is I am wrong.

Yes, that IS ACTUALLY NOW IN WRITING.

Hannibal is technically an “anti-villain.”

Why an Anti-Villain?

Why the anti-villain and not just a plain old regular villain? There is nothing wrong with a regular villain. Once we are finished here, however, I don’t know if y’all will ever see a “regular” villain again.

In fact, many of our favorite villains are favorites precisely because they refuse to neatly fit into their category.

As audiences grow increasingly sophisticated, the old tropes of noble good and pure evil are largely unworkable outside of genres like, say high-fantasy or speculative fiction. In speculative fiction, our protagonist might encounter a being from another dimension that is pure evil and okay. That’s fine.

Characters who are evil for the sake of being evil are terrible for genre fiction, but make excellent fodder for comedy and children’s cartoons.

Whenever we add in those additional layers that render our villain more nuanced and less “central-casting,” we could be tiptoeing around anti-villain territory.

Anti-Villains: Bad Deeds, “Good” Reasons

Two key questions differentiate the “anti-hero” from the “anti-villain”:

“What do they WANT?”

“What are they willing to DO to get what they want?”

A quick and convenient example might be Marvel’s villain, Thanos. For those who’ve slept through the last fifteen or so Marvel movies, Thanos is a supervillain self-appointed savior who’s goal is to “save” the planets of the universe…by murdering an “acceptable” percentage of the population.

*insert screeching record*

His contention is that resources are scarce (TRUE) and those who require resources too many (ok, TRUE). Add in his personal experiences with a planet devastated, and perfect anti-villain material.

Sure he WANTS to “save” the universe (TRUE in his mind), and the only way to do this is through randomly un-making billions of sentient beings (eh…NOT TRUE).

While plenty of folks might agree with his assertion that resources are scarce and we need to use wisdom in how we proceed, MOST people are not going to be cool with wholesale genocide.

Ultimately, HOW he is going about his goal is what makes him a villain.

Anti-Hero or Anti-Villain?

Why I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE anti-heroes and anti-villains is they are so mercurial. They’re slippery and not easily defined, and that makes them fascinating.

In The Silence of the Lambs, Special Agent Clarice Starling is the protagonist (hero), yet one could argue her greatest ALLY was Hannibal. She wouldn’t have had the first clue where to begin even looking for Buffalo Bill without Hannibal’s help.

Here, one could reasonably argue he is an anti-hero. Hannibal is partnering with “good guys” to take down an “even worse bad guy.”

But is he?

Or is he playing 3-D chess and sees the long-game? That all the chaos will ultimately give him the opening to freedom.

Probably that.

Doing GOOD then, ultimately, only serves to FREE him to conceivably resume doing bad things (which he does).

Yet, like I mentioned earlier, most people DID cheer when he was following the head of the asylum at the end. Why would we cheer?

It’s one of those micro-moments where Hannibal is an anti-hero. He’s willing to jeopardize his freedom to a) make sure Clarice is okay and to b) exact punishment on a terrible human being who’s been victimizing/terrorizing/exploiting the most vulnerable in society.

Hannibal is definitely a villain, just he operates by a CODE that many people can respect.

In the second movie, Hannibal would have happily left the Italian detective alone had he followed the rules (rules are VERY important to Hannibal). Instead of upholding his oath as an officer of the law to protect and defend the public, however, the detective goes all mercenary because he wants the bounty that the monster millionaire Mason Vergen put on Hannibal’s head.

Not okay with Hannibal at ALL.

Ant-Villain & Law Abiding Citizen

Thanos, Darth Vader, and Hannibal Lecter are definitely among the most memorable and compelling villains on the page AND on the screen. I believe this is due in large part to their depth. They are very layered and have nuance…like actual people (anti-villains).

But what if we don’t want interstellar dictators or even serial killers? What if we just want a…regular person.

So glad y’all asked.

Probably one of my all-time FAVORITE movies is Law Abiding Citizen. When we talk about the different TYPES of anti-villains, the most dangerous is the “Villain in Name Only.” This villain isn’t, per se, evil and he has entirely different reasons for the fight with the protagonist.

His POV is extremely sympathetic and can toss our MC (and the audience) into deep moral crises.

In Law Abiding Citizen, Clyde Shelton is happily enjoying Christmas at home with his family…until he and his loved ones are the victims of a home invasion. The two perpetrators incapacitate Shelton then force him to watch as they brutalize his wife and young daughter before murdering them. Then, they set the house ablaze leaving him for dead.

Nick Rice, the prosecuting attorney, is the “good guy.”

He promises justice for Shelton’s dead loved ones, but then….

After evidence is mishandled, Rice’s case threatens to completely implode. Much to his own chagrin, he can only secure the death penalty for one of the offenders. In order to do this, however, he must agree to a slap-on-the-wrist plea deal for the other perpetrator (one that will set him free in a couple of years).

Ten years later.

Shelton summarily goes on the war path against a corrupt justice system filled with backroom deals, plea bargains, and other bull$%ittery….

…and can we blame him?

Those home invaders had NO IDEA who they actually messed with, and Rice genuinely wanted to do GOOD. Yet, even he would be hard pressed to say what he got for Shelton’s family was “justice.”

All the way to the END of the MOVIE, I was somewhat rooting for Shelton (technically the villain). And I was not alone!

It’s also hard for the protagonist, Rice, to feel like Shelton is truly “the bad guy.” Not only is he disgusted he had to even offer that horrid plea deal to begin with. He of all people KNOWS the system is jacked up and flawed and imperfect, but—sadly—it’s the best one we have.

Neither man is wholly wrong…and THAT is why this story and those like it, are so darn amazing and memorable.

The Anti-Villain Says More About YOU

…than anything else.

One of the reasons anti-heroes and anti-villains are so easy to confuse is because, first of all, they are complex. How many all bad or all good people do YOU know? So there is that. Yet, they are still villains…or are they?

THAT is the critical question.

Non-fiction, to me, is learning through information. Fiction is still learning, just learning through imagination. This is uniquely true when it comes to appreciating the full spectrum of human emotions and experiences. Anti-villains are fantastic for this.

It is one thing to read some cold distant analysis like from the DSM-V. This diagnostic manual can tell us ALL about psychopathy, sociopathy, megalomania, narcissism, etc.

But fiction lets us LIVE it…from ALL sides.

I took the Clifton Strengths test and one of my core strengths is BELIEF. My sense of right and wrong, just and unjust make me who I am.

So, in Law Abiding Citizen, when Shelton (a former DARPA engineer) decides to burn down all the people responsible for such a disgusting miscarriage of justice?

It is almost impossible for me not to be on his side…at least a little.

When Hannibal took out Dr. Frederick Chilton? Not one fig given. When he kills Mason Vergen? Again, horrible human being and—because Vergen is rich and powerful—Hannibal the only one who CAN take him out.

And I think I should stop there….

Why Do We Love/Hate Characters?

My somewhat dubious moral compass is obvious when we look at characters I love and hate. A therapist would have LOADS of fun hearing my opinions of A Game of Thrones.

Anyway…

Law & Order: S.V.U. I LOVED Elliot Stabler and HATED Olivia Benson, and it is all because of one episode.

A child-killer is toying with the N.Y.P.D. and sealing little kids away with a finite amount of air. Then, the killer leads the police on a merry chase while children slowly suffocate.

During the pursuit, Stabler and Benson KNOW they have the guy, and he’s playing games. It’s nothing they can really prove, more instinct. What is worse is they only have about an hour before yet another child smothers to death.

Elliot does the right thing (in my mind). He waterboards the @$$^&le in his own toilet until he coughs up the location of the final child…along with about a gallon of water and his right kidney.

…and Olivia turns him into Internal Affairs.

Because she is Lawful Good.

To her, the ends do not justify the means. Elliot, conversely, is willing to risk losing his job by betting on his instincts. It is worth his career or even freedom so long as that child lives.

I can relate to that much more (which is why we are happy I became a WRITER ).

And that is awesome and kind of scary, too. It is unsettling to acknowledge one’s “darker” inclinations, but I feel we are deluding ourselves if we think we are devoid of any. Everyone has a dark side, and (to a degree) there is nothing wrong with that. I feel it is tremendously healthy to know and accept one’s flaws and limitations.

Anti-villains are a great mirror to gaze into for some perspective.

This is why fiction is AMAZING! …and scary

We can live vicariously through other characters and experience the world in a far richer way. Stories allow us a way to face our fears, meet our dark side, consider the world from a different perspective.

Ultimately, whether a character is considered an anti-villain or anti-hero, largely depends on the time period, the culture, and the individual viewer. How we categorize those amorphous characters says way more about us than the author ever intended.

And if you ever meet me and Allison Brennan? Our “debate” makes total sense. We are different people with different experiences and backgrounds and ALL of that colors our world.

***She’s clearly the goody-goody *rolls eyes*

So what do your favorite characters say about YOU?

What are your thoughts on anti-villains?

What do your favorite characters say about you? Have you ever heard of the “anti-villain”? Do you see where we could easily get into a debate whether or not we have an anti-hero or an anti-villain? Any examples of anti-villains you’d like to add from the page or screen?

I LOVE COMMENTS!

To prove it and show my love, for the month of SEPTEMBER, everyone who leaves a comment, I will put your name in a hat.

I actually have landed agents for people who’ve won this contest. Agents like me because I make their lives easier.

***It’s been a short holiday week and I will post the winners next blog. Apologies.

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 (and maybe even time with an agent).

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). People with superlative writing, I (with your permission) have been known to pass you onto an agent.

Anyway, I look forward to reading your comments and your writing!

The post Anti-Villains & Why We Love GOOD Baddies appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

Aspiring writers. There are so many out there. MILLIONS! BILLIONS (if we count bots). I just returned home from the Idaho Writer’s Guild Conference, where there were rooms and rooms full of aspiring writers.

Since y’all weren’t there, now it is your turn. I want anyone who refers to themselves as an aspiring writer to raise their hands.

No worries.

You are probably alone and only the pets can see you. Or, people around you already know you’re weird and won’t bat an eye.

Raise that hand! Aspiring writers? Anyone?

If you raised your hand, now I want you to take that hand and SLAP YOURSELF AND NEVER EVER REFER TO YOURSELF AS AN ASPIRING WRITER EVER AGAIN!

I’m watching you O_O.

I have people…everywhere…..

*cue creepy music*

Thing is, first of all, I would BET MONEY most of you already have a computer hard-drive FULL of short stories, poems, novels (finished, unfinished, good, bad, not fit to be let out among the human race for fear it might unleash the apocalypse). Point is y’all have written ZILLIONS of WORDS.

Meaning, writers write. You already ARE a writer. There is no try only DO. Aspiring is for wimps. This job is tough and it sure as sh sprinkles isn’t for everyone.

No More Aspiring Writers

Today’s post is here to help y’all, recharge, reframe, regroup and hopefully have some laughs. Everything I mention, we will deep-dive…LATER.

Where was I? Ah yes…

QUIT being an aspiring writer. Feel free to refer to yourself as a pre-published author. If you have some moxie, go for pre-best-selling author. For those who have the ego of GOD like me? Pre-internationally-best-selling-global-dominating-mega-author.

That one can get long on a business card. So maybe an acronym PIBSGDMA?

Or not.

The point is that if we aspire to be a writer, that presumes we are not already a writer. How we approach this business is critical because the odds are NOT in our favor. We have better odds of winning the lottery as we are struck by lightning than we do of being a mega-author.

Yes, I know. You feel super inspired.

One of the reasons the odds are SO stacked against us is simple. We can be our own worst enemies. Time to get out of our own way!

What Kind of Writer Do You Want to Be?

First, the good news. This is a FABULOUS time to be a writer. In Ye Olde Publishing Days, there were essentially two ways to be published—traditional and vanity. Either you fought through gatekeepers or you paid to play.

You were constrained to what the market wanted. If you didn’t write that, or your first book was a stinker? NEXT! You were also limited in how many books you could produce. There was really no outlet for the I-write-a-book-a-month-cyborgs-writers.

***Yes, my jealousy showing a little.

Today? If you write poetry, novellas, shorts, flash fiction, haiku, recipes, haiku-recipes…it DOES NOT MATTER. Why? Because you literally can publish anything you want. If you want to publish a book a week, you can.

If you write super LOOOOONG and only want to publish your 230,000 word tomes once a year? You can do that, too (and in like 17 different ways).

Now, the bad news.

Writers can publish anything they want and how often they want.

Herein Lies the Problem

With SO many changes in the market, have you taken time to decide what KIND of writer you want to be?

When I started writing, TWO choices. Then, as the digital age happened, we could go indie, then hybrid. So, FOUR choices.

Now? I literally cannot write out all the new ways there are to get our work in front of readers (and be PAID). Between so many avenues in self-pub and indie, then domestic and foreign markets, it is dizzying (and for other days and other posts).

There are some really successful writers out there, and not all of them *clutches pearls* write full-time. Why? Because the market is so oversaturated it is STOOPID.

It passed being STUPID in 2013 and is now STOOPID.

The odds of being to able to write full-time for a living and still sleep and, like, see the sun are not great…but not impossible. And if writing full-time as your sole income is your goal? Go for it!

But if publishing a rich, robust, deeply introspective novel once a year is your jam? Do it. If you love writing literary candy corn and can put out 3 or 5 or more books a year, do it!

Something in between? Do it. Until you can’t do it, then revisit the plan.

My point is, y’all need to get specific. Other than aspiring, what kind of writer are you? How do you define success?

Heck! I had to get specific. If you read my last post I wrote it while curled in the fetal position listening to DIDO. I was BURNED out. So burned out I couldn’t see the forest for the rose bushes (I was a bit lost)…which is why conferences are invaluable and for another post.

No More Aspiring

So, now you (hopefully) have read this far and you can stop calling yourself an aspiring writer. You already are a writer. OWN IT!

If you still aren’t convinced, I can tell you aspiring writers do exist. These are the people who say things like:

Yeah, I loved “Game of Thrones.” One day when I have enough time I’d like to write a fantasy novel.

Sure, because writing frigging GoT is just like whipping out an EMAIL! And time is the only thing separating them from being George R.R. Martin.

For the record, writing does not work like evolution.

*shock face*

We cannot type a couple sentences then wait thirty million years and magically have a series. Or maybe we can, but we won’t be around to see the fruit of our labors. But, I am still betting on NO.

In writing there is a DIVINE CREATOR—US–and intelligent design (if we do our jobs well).

*rant over….mostly*

What is a Aspiring REAL Writer?

I have no idea why we writers get all existential with their careers. Can you image how weird it would be if dentists wandered around wondering if they were a real dentist?

Where was I?

Writers.

Look it up. Writers write. It is literally the definition. But what is YOUR definition of a “real writer”?

If the definition of a real writer only included those who solely write novels for a living, then we just excluded Edgar Allen Poe, Charles Dickens, Ernest Hemingway, and Mark Twain (to name a couple). Many of the greatest writers in history (and even today) still have a day job for a number of reasons.

Maybe they love the stability that goes with having a job and benefits. Because they aren’t HYSTERICAL they won’t be able to—I dunno—pay the power bill, they’re able to write and publish because of things like…they can SEE better when the lights work.

Amazing, right?

Some of us also keep a day job because we like doing OTHER things that are not writing. We need to be able to get out of our own heads because it’s dark and spooky in there. Other writers DO have the ability to write full-time (maybe your partner works) and so go you!

Still real.

What Works? What Doesn’t?

When we shift our mindset from aspiring, our goals shift from passive to active. So long as I was aspiring I floated along, believing there was only one way (my way) even though it wasn’t working.

Because I pivoted in my mindset and profession, this gave me permission to try new things, I could incorporate what worked, what didn’t and at least I gave it a shot.

Just like I’m asking you to quit calling yourselves aspiring writers, I also want you to quit believing there is only ONE way.

Unless you’re already happily writing a book a month, Netflix is making them ALL into movies, and you like to relax in a bathtub full of royalty money.

***If this is you, um. Please email adopt me.

On the other hand? If you aren’t finishing? You’re burning out? Your books are good but aren’t selling? Your way used to work but isn’t working now?

Try something different.

Possibly reframe how you are thinking and question it. Perhaps your definitions, goals, or expectations need to be dusted off and revised.

I also want to send you over to Becca Syme’s Better-Faster Academy. Do yourself a favor and buy HER book, Dear Writer, You Need to Quit. Then READ IT. Buy ALL of them, but at least start there.

This is Me Post-Becca…

When I went to this conference, my head was so far up my tail, doctors could have performed a colonoscopy and an eye exam at the same time. I was overburdened, helpless and hopeless. On the flight home, I read snorted Becca’s book like a line of cocaine.

SOOOO many answers.

I have many more incredible resources to share with you guys, experts who are NOT ME. That is what’s fabulous about our industry. Books are not so cost-prohibitive we can only buy ONE. Also, not all experts have all answers so you have a TEAM of us out there to help you.

Meaning, expect to drink from a firehose more in coming posts. And, since y’all are all now pre-published writers, you will need the best team you can get.

What Are Your Thoughts?

I LOVE hearing from you. Are you calling yourself a pre-published writer now? Were you “today-years-old” when you realized there were more than, like THREE, paths to publish? Are you relieved that you are still a REAL writer even if you always have a day job?

Were you losing hope that there wasn’t a home for your writing? Did you think you had failed because you’d never revised your definition of what a REAL writer was?

I love hearing from you in the comments! It helps fuel me to keep on going. After seventeen years, I’m apparently powered by caffeine and compliments.

I REWARD Initiative!

To prove it and show my love, for the month of MAY, 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 (and maybe even time with an agent).

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). People with superlative writing, I (with your permission) have been known to pass you onto an agent.

I actually have landed agents for people who’ve won this contest. Agents like me because I make their lives easier.

Anyway, I look forward to reading your comments and your writing!

The post Aspiring Writers Need to Quit NOW appeared first on Kristen Lamb.

Self-sabotage is something most writers are likely familiar with. We just about get in the habit of working on the WIP (work in progress), and then suddenly we put everyone and everything ahead of finishing that book. Usually they’re noble causes, too. Cleaning the house, organizing the closets, alphabetizing the pets….

I work hard to make “success” books part of my morning routine when I’m doing my chores: making the coffee, making the bed, putting on any laundry, etc. One of my favorite audio books is “Atomic Habits” by James Clear. Namely because the advice is practical, doable, and aligns with my personal value system.

No shade on the “believe it enough and it will happen folks,” but there is also a degree of WORK involved in reaching any goal.

This is why we must learn to ignore the outside voices and take the helm of our own destinies.

Results Reinforce Habits

Why did I bring up “Atomic Habits?” Other than it’s a good book? There was something I read this morning that I feel needs expounding. Clear notes, correctly, that when we see evidence of our habits, that reinforces our identity.

When I declutter daily, I see my surroundings are neat and tidy. Therefore, eventually I identify as an organized person.

But what about being a writer?

Becoming a writer will likely be one of the hardest things any of us does, and for a number of reasons. Unlike eating healthy, working out, saving money, or systematically decluttering our living spaces, much of what we writers do is in the dark. There are many times we will have to press on using sheer force of will and blind faith.

We’ll have to write simply for the love of writing.

We can write millions of words, dozens of books, even publish books and I GUARANTEE you at least ONE @$$hat out there will intimate what we do is not “real.”

Whether they do this out of jealousy, misguided good intentions, or simply not thinking before they speak? Who knows? Yet, I can tell you that, after 16 years of working with all levels of writers, many of them household names? The insecurity never goes away. If anything, it gets worse.

Anything Here Familiar?

I just published a book!

Them: Yes, but you self-published.

My debut novel received almost a hundred rave reviews.

Them: Yes, Amazon really is trying to crack down on fake reviews. Are you sure they’re all real?

My book hit #1 as a best-seller.

Them: Amazon best-sellers aren’t REAL best-sellers.

My book made the NYT Best-Seller list.

Them: Everyone knows the NYT list doesn’t account for actual sales and the numbers are manipulated.

I just published my tenth novel!

Them: How nice. Amazing that Philip K. Dick wrote 44 novels and over 120 short stories. And Stephen King has written 9000 novels and 43,000 short stories.

Okay, I was being a bit silly there because I was starting to depress myself.

The point is we cannot rely on external validation. That is a formula to end up curled in the fetal position washing down raw cookie dough with tequila.

I also mention this because, we’ll self-sabotage wasting time pondering if we are “real writers” instead of WRITING!

What can happen is we’ll keep moving the goal post of what makes us a “real writer.” Eventually, we’ll give up because we set that standard SO high we crumble under the pressure.

Here are a few fun blogs to remind y’all that writers write. Plain and simple.

Diagnosing a REAL Writer: Do You Have Terminological Inexactitude Syndrome?

This is Gonna Leave a Mark: What Makes a “Real” Writer

Real Writers Don’t Self-Publish (Part One and SATIRE)

Real Writers Don’t Self-Publish (Part Two and ALSO SATIRE)

The Personal Apocalypse—When are We REAL Writers?

Self-Sabotage & Fear of Failure

I’ve been on social media since before it went mainstream in 2006, which means I’ve experienced and witnessed enough Imposter Syndrome to last many lifetimes. One of the main reasons we are SO hesitant to call ourselves a writer is precisely because of the head games mentioned above.

Critics will always find some reason to diminish what you’ve accomplished.

Most people fear failure, which is dumb because failing is the only way humans learn. How many of us would berate a toddler every time they fell learning how to walk? We learn by DOING, and we improve by FAILING.

Yet, our culture has ingrained fear of failure into our DNA. My parents never cared about the 90 questions I answered correctly, only the 10 I missed. Schools punish failure, jobs punish failure, culture punishes failure.

Want to know the one phrase that vexes me to no end? “One-hit wonder.”

Despite the FACT that many “one-hit wonder” songs have defined pop culture and even entire generations, our culture still saddles them with that term.

They were KUNG-FU fighting!

867-5309

Oh Mickey you’re so fine, you’re so fine you blow my mind.

Pass the Dutchie on the left-hand side.

Taaake ooooon meeee! Taaaaake meeeee ONNNNNNN!

Stop! Collaborate and listen!

Woot, there it is! Woot, there it is!

The dreams in which I’m dying are the best I’ve ever had. It’s a mad world.

What does the fox say?

Now that y’all have at least ONE of those stuck in your head, I hope I made my point. Go check out the list of one-hit wonders who, by definition, are “failures.” This is to point out the lunacy of our culture. So don’t look to it to feed your ego.

Self-Sabotage & Fear of Success

Many writers who do successfully hit a “real” best-seller list (whatever “real” might be defined as) then struggle with if they can do it again. Or will they be the dreaded…one-hit wonder?

Because if one book sold hundreds of millions of copies and redefined culture as we know it…but the author doesn’t KEEP doing that…then they failed.

Makes TOTAL sense.

Yet, we can fall into habits of self-sabotage not only because we fear we’ll fail (never finish the book, never land an agent/book deal, be published, make a list, etc.) but precisely because we are afraid we WILL accomplish these things.

What if I only have one good book in me?

I made Whatever Prestigious List, but was it a fluke? Can I do it again? What if I can’t?

This might all sound rather silly, but emotions aren’t always logical. Remember, perfect is the enemy of the great. It is also the enemy of the FINISHED. No half-finished “perfect” book ever became a runaway success, but some very much less-than-perfect ones have.

We’ve covered fear of failure and fear of success, but the one I really want to explore today is the notion of whether or not we deserve success.

I Don’t Deserve It

When we’re stuck in a culture that doesn’t value what we do, it’s easy to believe (at least subconsciously) that writing is some extra indulgence. A hobby, a guilty pleasure, something to be done after doing REAL work.

Many of us are partners or parents or are taking care of loved ones. We believe that when the laundry is done, the dishes washed, the beds made, the bills paid, the pets brushed, the curtains are washed, the ceiling is repainted…THEN we can write. As if writing is not a profession, but a treat to be doled out for good behavior.

THIS is a mindset we must change if we want to go pro. For the record, I STILL struggle with this. I have to MAKE myself get up and write first thing. All the while the siren’s song of dishes, litter boxes, email, and bills are calling me.

I’d love to say I’m always successful, but I try to keep my lying to fiction. There are many reasons this profession is TOUGH and not for everyone.

Fight for Your Right to Write

Yes, it can be a battle with others, but mostly with ourselves. Many of us have a lot of bad programming we need to overcome.

I grew up in a dysfunctional family (a.k.a. typical 80s family). Whenever I wanted something, my parents had a list of common responses:

Do you have a job?

Are you the one paying the bills?

Money doesn’t grown on trees.

Me DESIRING something was intrinsically tethered to my monetary contribution to the home (or said equivalent). Since I didn’t bring home a salary, ergo I had no right to want and did not deserve anything. I only deserved when I a) made good grades b) cleaned my room c) did my chores.

Seeing a pattern here? How many writers don’t write because their writing doesn’t make money, but their writing isn’t making money because they aren’t writing? We unwittingly self-sabotage and that self-sabotage just exacerbates the feedback loop from hell.

Been there, have the box of t-shirts.

No More Self-Sabotage: You Deserve It

We all deserve our dreams. If your dream is to be a writer, then YES, that will demand a lot of work. As in writing, rewriting, reading, studying, learning, researching, building a brand/platform, cultivating an audience, showing up day after day and putting down words no matter what.

What being a writer does NOT entail is you being a good little you and doing all your chores and “real” work before you’re allowed to go write.

If no one has yet given you permission to go write, I will.

WRITERS WRITE. Enough said.

Ultimately, we are in charge. There will always be people who will criticize, tell us why we are poseurs, fakes, fools, hacks, etc. Until we realize that all of that just goes with the territory and get to work ANYWAY, we’ll find every reason not to sit butt in chair and write.

We will revise the opening of that novel 9,763 times. Start new books while abandoning half-finished ones. We’ll believe we can’t succeed because (INSERT REASON HERE) and we’ll talk ourselves out of even trying. Ultimately, we won’t even need the outside world to work against us, because we’ll figure out a way to self-sabotage before they get the chance.

BUT, that is what happens when we are operating in auto-pilot. Now that, hopefully, we are more aware of counterproductive behaviors/ideas/attitudes, we can take action.

Think about all those one-hit wonders.

They did the work, learned to sing, play an instrument, or at least be brave enough to put themselves OUT THERE. And maybe they never made it into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, but you know what?

Don’t worry. Be happy .

What are your thoughts on self-sabotage?

Are you guilty of shooting yourself in the metaphorical foot? Do you put everyone’s needs ahead of your own? Does writing feel like some guilty indulgence instead of the meaningful profession it is? Have you struggled with the notion of what makes a “real” writer?

What have you done to overcome these issues? Do you have any suggestions or tips? Hey, I am a work in progress ALWAYS and love the feedback!

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