How to Answer That Dreaded Question

Look, I'm a writer. Writing is ingrained into my soul. I'm not happy if I'm not writing. I always have one foot in reality and the other in my imaginary world. I'm sure most of you feel the same.

So naturally when I meet someone at a party or social gathering, who I am comes up in conversation. "Oh, I'm a writer," I'll say.

And then it happens. Every. Single. Time. That dreaded question. "Have you had anything published?"

Being a writer isn't about being published. I'm not claiming to be a "published author." But those non-writer types (more fondly referred to as muggles) don't understand that. If you don't have a book on the store shelves, you're not a legit writer.

After having had to answer this question more times than I can count, I've come up with a way to keep myself amused until I can finally answer, "Yes. Go buy it." Here are some answers to use and enjoy:

1. No. Drink?

2. Yes. I'm the ghost writer for J.K. Rowling.

3. Sure. Why not?

4. Yup, it's coming out in four years. The title's subject to change. So is my pen name. Keep an eye out for it!

5. Oh look over there, a pigeon! *runs away*

6. Yeah, but it's stuff you wouldn't read. Trust me. *shifty eyes*

7. These tapas are amazing.

8. No. You?

9. Give me your money and I'll send a copy to you. Honest. (Bonus points if you can get them to "buy" one for their friends.)

10. *set self on fire à la Hyperbole and a Half*

Any more suggestions?

Superhuman? I think so.

Ahaha, are you ready for this?

School holidays have just finished.

Two weeks.

80 thousand words.

My latest WiP is DONE.

I can't even begin to describe how good it feels. 80k. Eighty. Thousand. Words. I've never written a finished manuscript this long, let alone a first draft. (The last first draft I wrote was 36k. Seriously.) While I don't know if I can technically call this a first draft, it was written from scratch, with only the setting and maybe three characters the same. The plot had changed from fighting a Beast to... nothing even remotely related. In fact, the fantasy elements were taken out altogether.

But how did I go from writing teeny tiny first drafts to this mammoth of a manuscript?

Plotting.

It's possible that those who know me have just fainted on the spot. I know, right? Me? Plot? NEVER!

That's what I used to think, and I'm not sure how well I'll do if I tried it again, but goodness, it worked this time, guys. I was lucky enough to have recently attended an advanced writing class hosted by Juliet Marillier, and she mentioned her plotting methods and how she didn't understand the whole "pantser" thing because she couldn't imagine doing a million drafts. And I thought, wait, you don't have to do a million drafts? So I had a go at plotting, writing the whole story out scene by scene then adding scenes when necessary, and viola! I now have a real, much-more-advanced-than-usual first draft that has a decent word count.

I'm so excited. I'm off to do my victory dance. How's everyone else's writing going?

The Lucky Seven Meme

Morgan Hyde tagged me in the Lucky Meme (you know the one), and I haven't done a post in a while, so I figured I'd go ahead with it.

Here are the rules in case you've been living in a coffin:

1. Go to the 7th or 77th page of your current WIP

2. Go down to the 7th line

3. Copy the next 7 sentences or paragraphs and post them AS IS (no secret editing - the guilt monkeys will know).

This one's from the seventh page of my current WiP:

How? How could wax be this stubborn? Did it take after the personality of its owner or something?

She ducked down and checked the cupboard under the sink. It was cluttered with Bluet's many products and...

Dissolving fluid.

If it wasn't mildly acidic she would have kissed the bottle. Every privy needed dissolving fluid, and chances were it wouldn't damage the leather.

She used toilet tissue to dab a bit onto the boot and held her breath. The wax sizzled away. The leather remained unharmed. Thank the King.

"Miss Stella, what exactly are you doing in there with my boot?"

Stella almost dropped the bottle and the boot. Merse opened the door and stared at her. "Are you quite finished?"

If you want to be tagged, consider yourself tagged! And link me in the comments so I can read it :)

Interview with Tansy Rayner Roberts

I'm lucky enough to have on the blog today the magnificent Tansy Rayner Roberts, author of the Creature Court trilogy.

For those of you who haven't yet had the pleasure of reading these stories, you're missing out on the most epic world building and character development I've ever read.

With setting, I'm talking about a magical version of Rome, viewed through a Gothic Victorian lens. (Her words, seriously). Seriously.

Seriously.

How much do you want to read these books???

I've tried not to include any spoilery information in the interview questions, so you can read how she does it without ruining anything. You should know I'd rate the series R for sex, language, and gore. If that hasn't scared you off, the first in the series is POWER AND MAJESTY.

Hi Tansy! Thanks so much for doing this interview. I just finished THE SHATTERED CITY this morning, and OMG I can't wait to jump into book three! (Although I'm going to cry if my favourite characters die, ug.)

The main reason I wanted to do this interview with you is because the world building in the Creature Court series is incredible. I have so much to ask you about your planning and plot development, and I thought I'd share the answers with everyone rather than hog all your insights to myself.

First, obvious question: Is there a story behind where you came up with the idea for the Creature Court series? Did it happen instantaneously, like a burst of inspiration, or did it come to you slowly? How long did the series take you to write?

The first spark of it was when a little brown mouse invaded my writing room, back at the last house we lived in. I walked in and saw it halfway up the leg of the computer chair, and it suddenly froze as if maybe I wouldn't notice it, if it wasn't moving. So there was that...

Then I started to get the idea of this dressmaker character, and she wouldn't settle in my head until I found her name, which took AGES (I knew it started with V).

There were a few other scenes here and there which came together as the story started to build in my head, probably a good year or more before I started writing it down. I was working on other things, but this one kept invading. The first scene I wrote was an introduction to Ashiol which never made it into the book, where he's running through a city being destroyed by unseen forces, and then slowly the city begins to fix itself before his eyes, and his scars literally wriggle off his body. Elements of that found their way into the final story - and there is the key scene in the first book where we (and Velody) see his scars disappear, but pretty much everything else changed over the years & drafts.

The first book took the longest time to write, but that was more through interruption and circumstance than the story itself being difficult - The year I started writing it down was also the year I was trying to finish my PhD, and the year I became pregnant with my first daughter, so, TIMING. I had to set this book down when it was only 2/3 drafted, in order to finish my thesis before I had my baby which, haha, of course didn't quite work out in the right order. Plus my supervisor retired at the end of the same year, a month before Raeli was born. It would have been so perfect if I'd finished my thesis that year... but I didn't. So Creature Court languished for long periods while I sorted everything else out. The benefit was that I got to workshop that first book a couple of times, at varying stages of completion, with my writing group, ROR. They were the ones that pointed out I had started it in the wrong place (that scene with Velody and Ash in the marketplace, and him getting his powers back) and I had to go back and fill in how they got there.

Working backwards, the first novel was published in mid 2010 but sold I think in late 2008. The book was finished a year before that, in late 2007 which was when it first started to be noticed by potential publishers and agents thanks to the first chapter being published on my friend Marianne De Pierres' website. But I started writing it in early 2004, and planning it at least a year before that.

Phew.

2. I have to ask about the city of Aufluer. It's absolutely gorgeous - possibly my favourite setting of all time. How would you describe it to someone who's never read the series?

Thank you so much, that's lovely to hear!

Aufleur is a skewed, magical version of Rome, viewed through a Gothic Victorian lens. Of course it's not really Rome at all, though I did build it on my head based on one lovely month of living in Rome and travelling everywhere on foot. I wanted it to be a tall, dark and handsome city that seduces readers with its cathedrals, storefronts and sinister secrets.

3. I find the reality of Aufluer is in the painstakingly crafted detail you've added to the series. How did you go about coming up with this world? Even in LOVE AND ROMANPUNK, which is a collection of short stories, you have so much history and reality drenched in your writing. Did you sit down and plot every festival/ritual/accompanying food and drink/building etc, or did you let it come to you as you wrote?

Mostly I worldbuild one detail at a time, as the story itself is unfolding. The festivals system of Aufleur required quite a bit of work, though, if only to keep track of things as I made them up, so as not to contradict myself later! I started with the Ancient Roman Fasti (calendar of festivals) as my starting point, as I was unduly influenced by Ovid's poem in honour of the many, many ancient festivals observed and/or ignored by the people of Augustan Rome. But I added a whole bunch more for emphasis, because I wanted the festivals of Aufleur to be even more outrageous and elaborate than the Roman system - I wanted an economy that revolved around the various observances, and I knew that would be relevant to my protagonist Velody and her friends, because their business revolved around the making of gowns, garlands etc. for the festivals.

Partly this was to create a sense of conspicuous consumption in the daylight folk but I also wanted to look at the kind of daily work that goes on in a city, and to show that Velody's priorities were already pretty fixed once the magical world intruded on her life. Imagine if Buffy the Vampire Slayer hadn't come into her powers until she was in her late 20's and had a job and a mortgage to juggle? I don't think she would have managed to slay nearly as many monsters...

But yes, there was a spreadsheet involved. And reference books.

4. Not only is there history in your setting, but each of your characters - especially in the Creature Court - have such a rich background. How did you go about creating these characters? Did you write a background story for each of them before you started the series?

I thought I was being terribly clever, telling an epic fantasy story from the point of view of slightly damaged adults as opposed to using a teenage farmboy as my starting point, but soon ran into trouble because of course they all had elaborate backstories and baggage to deal with! I worked this out mostly as I went but soon discovered that there wasn't a spreadsheet in the world big enough to factor in all the complexities of the Creature Court characters - most of their current relationships were deeply affected by the hierarchy of their world, where youngsters start off serving Lords as Courtesi, then become Lords themselves, and sometimes reach the level of King. So it completely made my head explode, figuring out all the details of who had served who, and when they had been promoted to Lord, and whom had served them, and in some cases many of them served more than one Lord. Their backstories changed as I needed them to, and a few of them - Livilla and Poet in particular - shifted allegiances as my chronology tangled itself up in knots.

Seriously. Even spreadsheets can't fix everything. I had a few fixed points such as certain ages of characters when particular events happened, and everything else orbited wildly around it. Sometimes I felt like I was juggling hamsters! Strange, sex-obsessed hamsters who liked to set fire to things.

5. Were you worried the reader wouldn't be able to keep track of such a broad cast list? (The only ones I'm having trouble with are the courtesi, but after the new character introduced at the end of the book two, I'm thinking we'll learn more about them in book three.) How do YOU keep track of the comings and goings of the heirarchy?

I worried a little bit, but mostly for myself. I think it helps that the story is told through several points of view, and so you get to see most characters from several different sides. Hmm. Maybe that doesn't TECHNICALLY simplify things. But because of the complexities I didn't have any qualms about just setting down details as they became relevant, through the observances of the characters. Ashiol, for instance, knows all the details of Livilla and Mars and well, everyone's sex life, and will happily supply any plot relevant details, either through dialogue or his brain. But he had been away for five years so even he needed things explained to him. Velody doesn't know who any of these people are, and what their connections are, but she's trying to work it out fast, and the readers get to go on that journey with them.

I realised quite late in the day that I didn't have a point of view character who was a courteso - all the other roles are covered, but that one wasn't. That was why Topaz joined the story in Book 2, another newcomer. And Book 3 has an ongoing flashback storyline from the point of view of one of our adult characters, giving new perspectives not only on what it's like for the youngsters when they first join the Creature Court, but also some insights into the emotional baggage and relationships of some of our favourites. I like to think all the bases are covered!

On the whole, though, there are a bunch of characters we really don't need to know about for the sake of the story, and there are some I've deliberately left blank because if I tried to go into detail about every single character, the reader would be lost, and I'd probably have thrown myself out of a window.

6. Any tips for writers who want to go into the type of depth with both setting and character background you have with the Creature Court series?

Spreadsheets are wonderful things! History will provide you with stranger and more wondrous facts than you can possibly ever invent. And it really does help to know everyone your protagonist has slept with, even if you never need to mention this in the narrative itself.

7. Finally, anything you want to plug while you're here? (Ahem, Galactic Suburbia, ahem ahem.)

Well I do have a rather lovely podcast you might be interested in! Galactic Suburbia was recently nominated for a Hugo, and it's basically me and my friends Alisa (indie publisher Twelfth Planet Press) and Alex (Atheling-winning reviewer) talking about speculative fiction, books, publishing news and chat. We're very proud of it.

You can also find my short story collection, Love and Romanpunk, over at Twelfth Planet Press in print or e-book (though we are nearly out of print of the print version I hear! Down to the last box). I recently had stories appear in the anthologies Beyond Binary (Lethe Press) and Epilogue (Fablecroft). I also have an essay in the upcoming book Chicks Unravel Time (Mad Norwegian Press), in which every season of Doctor Who is analysed by a different female writer, fan or critic. I'm writing about The Trial of a Time Lord and the problematic death/undeath of Peri Brown.

Most of my snark and book-related thoughts can be found on Twitter (@tansyrr) and my blog (http://tansyrr.com/).

Thank you so much for answering my questions! I'm off to read the last book, and cling to the hope that this is going to end well...

Are you convinced yet? Haha, thought so. RUSH AND BUY THIS SERIES NOW!

Done!

I've finished the first draft of my latest WiP! *pause for cheers* Some stats for the interested parties:

Total word count - 52,129

Projected word count (once I've added in all the extras I thought of along the way... and fixed all the plot holes, ug): 75k-80k

Date started: 28th May this year

Current feeling towards ms: I never want to see it again (Kidding! Kind of)

What will happen next: Leave it to work on second WiP and come back to it in a month or so... hopefully with a little more enthusiasm than what I'm leaving it with

YAY! Party for all!

How's everyone else's WiP going?

To Kill a Mockingbird

This is another post for my book reviews for writers. I break down the main plot and character components of a novel and discuss what writers can take away from it.

Plot

The first time I read this book was in primary school, and I'm surprised I a) got through it, and b) understood a single word. It was tricky for me to follow, the main plot didn't happen until almost halfway through the book, and the tension went up and down erratically throughout the story. Why does it work? It's a classic, it was written in 1960, and readers were looking for something different than what they look for today.

So could we try a story like that? Tricky, not impossible. But I wouldn't recommend trying it unless you're a pro. Why?

My answer is based on a theory I have about today's readers in general. With technology making things simplistic and instant, people expect everything to happen Now Now Now. That's why I think YA has become so popular - usually YA books get right to the point, are quick, and are easy enough to get through in less than a day.

Lesson: if you're going to go down the path of a plot line similar to classics such as TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, I'd recommend you know exactly what you're doing and know whether it will work with your target audience.

Character

Atticus. Oh, Atticus, Atticus, Atticus. Perfect in every way. In danger of being the biggest Gary-Stu around. So why isn't he?

Firstly, the story is narrated by his daughter Scout in two ways - a) her looking back on childhood moments, and b) her living those moments as the nine-year-old. It's natural and understandable that both versions of Scout would portray him as the flawless, generous man he is in the book. A young girl often looks at her father in such a light, and older Scout might have lost her father by that stage so of course she might remember him as a better man than what he was.

Secondly, a Gary-Stu is not only perfect, but everyone loves him. That's not the case with Atticus Finch. He's attacked, abused, and ridiculed by the townspeople throughout the entire case. This invokes sympathy from the reader instead of disgust.

Both of these cases have to be included to work in Atticus's favour and to keep him from being so perfect it makes the reader close the book in disgust. They're written in balance of each other, as carefully as every gesture, word, and action is written in terms of the character himself.

Lesson: If you're going to write a character with so many amazing qualities, make sure there are (real) ways to balance out the "too-perfect" syndrome, not just one little quirky fault.

Prepare to be Outraged

I hope you have a cup of chamomile tea to drink while you're reading this, because if you're anything like me your blood might actually boil with indignant rage. I saw this article years ago and it still makes me seethe whenever I think about it.

An author (I can't remember who, so there's no point asking me) once put a "How to Deal with Telling People You're a Writer" post up. I figured hey, that'd be a fun read. Sometimes it can be a pain telling people you're a writer when you always get the same types of eye-rolling responses.

One of the points was when people ask "But are you a real writer?" kind of question. The author addressed this by saying something along the lines of "Don't worry about this line of questioning. They're only asking because too many people go around saying they're writers even though they haven't gotten published."

...too many people go around saying they're writers even though they haven't gotten published.

I'm sorry, WHAT?

(Urge to kill rising, rising...)

EXCUSE ME. I've spent eleven years writing stories. Working on manuscripts. Researching the publishing world, following agents, reviewing books, editing, rewriting, screaming at frustration at the computer when that scene SIMPLY WOULDN'T WORK. How DARE that author assume I'm not a writer just because I haven't gotten published?

Writing is in my blood. My fingertips tingle when I sit down to tell a story. Even if I never get published, I won't be able to stop creating worlds and people and crazy situations. What part of that ISN'T being a writer?

If you ever hear or see something like this, lift your chin, give an indignant snort of disapproval, and walk away. What does that person know about you and your passions? And when I find the author that wrote that book, I am never, NEVER going to buy their work, because hey, who needs them?

THE STEPSISTER SCHEME

This story takes place after the happily-ever-afters of several fairy tales (and we're talking the OLD versions, with all the gruesome stuff included), where the princesses of Cinderella, Snow White, and Sleeping Beauty have become kind of Charlie's Angels/spies/sorceresses/rescuers.

Sounds good, right? That's what I thought, anyway.

Unfortunately, I barely made it through this book. I skim read most of it just so I could be done with it. How could such a great premise be so boring?

What I've done is broken the problems down for you to see what didn't work so that you can keep this in mind for your own writing. I've tried to include only minor spoilers, and hopefully you'll be able to benefit from this post even if you haven't read the book.

Please note these are purely my opinions. I'd also like to mention that the author seems like a great person, and I hate the fact I didn't like this book.

The MC

The main character was Danielle (aka Cinderella). I disliked her immensely. Firstly, she had no personal agenda. She was an empty character. I didn't find her interesting or relatable at all. Also, her stepsisters tried to kill her, they tortured her, they stole her husband and ahem, something else that will be spoilery... and she didn't get the slightest bit rage-y. She didn't want them hurt. She was like Sailor Moon, only it felt like she was more a pushover and annoyingly forgiving rather than kick-butt cool. There was one moment she lost her temper, but then rational thinking came in again and all hopes that the book would get interesting vanished.

Lesson: Don't make your character a perfect, forgiving, sickly sweet character. They're boring, and the reader will only get annoyed.

The Plot

So the prince is kidnapped and the girls have to go to Fairytown to rescue him. Sounds good! Sounds fun! Sounds like a great adventure!

It wasn't.

I've wracked my brain trying to figure out what was wrong. Why wasn't I interested in this? It's so up my alley! They shrank, they rode winged horses, they used swords and magic and all these awesome wa-pow! moves. So why didn't I care?

Partly it was due to the fact that the other two princesses were doing all the super cool stuff, while Danielle did barely anything. But the other part of my problem was there was nothing new. I'd seen all this before. Trolls, fairies, forests... done and done. Sure, there were a few different things in there, but where was that extra something that made it magical?

Lesson: If you have a true and tried setting, make sure you have LOTS of elements that are unique to your story. Also, small details add realism, generates reader interest, and breathes life into your world-building. Think of all the detail that was in the Harry Potter series.

Misc.

The toilet humour might be refreshing for some, but surely I'm not the only one who found the fart and privy jokes unnecessary and gross? This is a fairy tale book featuring three female characters. I accept that some readers might appreciate the humour. Not me.

Lesson: Think of your target audience!

The Benefits of a Writing Schedule

I'm the kind of person who loves sitting down to write. Sure, it might take me a little while to open the document and actually get started (I'm sure it's the same for many of you), but once I'm in my story, it can take a lot to pry me away. I've never really had a proper schedule - my plan was more just write, write, write... often until my fingers wanted to fall off. Does this sound familiar? Are you the same?

Hate to tell you, but I've discovered a lot of problems with this type of plan:

1. You feel guilty All. The. Time. if you have free time and you're not writing. You shouldn't have watched that episode of How I Met Your Mother! You should have been writing! There could have been an extra thousand words done in that time!

2. You often can't simply sit down for short writing breaks. Often you need to carve a chunk out of your day to feel successful.

3. The amount of writing you do (even 15k in a day!) doesn't feel like enough.

4. You can burn out. Badly.

5. Maybe the most important reason: It's quite possible that the reason you're writing so much isn't for the joy of writing - it's to get it finished. Getting it finished means you're ready for the next round. It means you can send it to betas. It means it's that much closer to being ready to query.

For those who've been following, you know why this is a problem. This kind of mindset means you're not writing for pleasure. You're writing to get published. And that leads to all kinds of new issues.

I've started setting myself a writing schedule (a chapter a day), and here's what's changed about my writing - and my life - so far:

1. I actually have time for other things. Relaxing! Reading! Watching television! Spending quality time with the boy! Accompanied by NO GUILT!

2. I've slowed down to enjoy the writing process. Each chapter has my full attention, because I don't have to worry about the next chapter until tomorrow.

3. Spacing my writing out means I have plenty of time to ponder over things that might happen in my story during the day. I've come up with lots of new ideas that might not have occurred to me if I'd ploughed through my WiP without that stopping time.

4. The health benefits! My fingers and back don't hurt so much because I don't spend hour upon hour at the computer.

5. Extra time for blog posts! :D

The great thing is, this works if you're a pantser OR a plotter. When you've plotted your story, you know what scene to write next and you're ready to go as soon as you open your document. If you have no idea where you're going with your story, you have extra time to think about what happens next because you'll stop after finishing the chapter. There's no pressure to continue right then and there.

It's kind of like exercise. Regular writing without over-exerting yourself can lift your game, rather than tumble it. Give it a go!

A Protagonist's Personal Agenda

This is one of those posts where I'm going to tell you something that seems obvious but can be overlooked too easily.

So your protagonist is about to embark on a character arc. They will be changed, and much will happen to them over the course of your book. They might even fall in love. Great!

However. The protagonist shouldn't just step into the story and start existing. They're not there purely for the plot and romance. They should already have goals, desires, motivations, history. You know that, but do you know that?

Your protagonist should have a life AS WELL AS the romantic plot, and even as well as the main plot. A personal agenda.

The idea of doing this isn't just to give the character realism. I find myself more empathetic towards a main character who's out doing something besides what the main plot (or romantic plot) requires.

I'll give you some examples:

1. In Marissa Meyer's CINDER, there were plenty of subplots, the romantic plot was with the prince, but Cinder's own agenda was to run away from her stepmother.

2. In HEART'S BLOOD by Juliet Marillier, the main plot was about the curse, the romantic plot was with Anluan, but Caitrin's personal agenda was to escape from (and later face) her own demons.

3. In LEGEND by Marie Lu, the main plot was about uncovering the truth about the murder, the romance was entangled with the main plot, but Day's own agenda was to get medicine for his family.

A lot of people complained Bella from TWILIGHT had no personality. At least part of this stems from her lack of personal agenda. Stuff happens to her, sure. But what does she do in the meantime? What does she want? What part of her can I root for?

I've only realised this consciously in the past few days. The main character in my current WiP has a lot happen to her, and there's a love story in there too, but until the plot starts she does very little on her own. She has problems to deal with that turn quite dangerous... but that still doesn't give her the characterisation I'm looking for.

In my next draft I might have her involved in a small political campaign, or trying to start up her own business - something that tells the reader who she is, but also introducing a danger of failing (and therefore giving the reader something to root for) without it directly being about the main (or romantic) plot. It will be her personal agenda, and it should make a world of difference to the story.

Think about your current WiP's main character. What is his or her personal agenda? If they haven't got one, try coming up with something they want for themselves OUTSIDE the main and romantic plots.