Books and Writing

Compelling first lines make a big difference

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Wed, 15 Apr 2026 03:17:00 +0000

People can often quote famous opening sentences from novels. They ring in the ears, with rhythm, intrigue and portent. “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” “It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife. “ “Captain Ahab was neither my first husband nor my last.”

You may well think – so what? These are like proverbs or pithy quotes. We remember them because they strike a chord. But your first sentence, if it’s a real winner (or a hook, or startling in some way), will entice your reader to keep going. And if your second sentence is just as good, and your third pulls the reader right into your story … well, who’s going to argue with that? Off to the checkout they go.

What does a first paragraph, made up of all those stunning sentences, actually achieve? Not just capturing your reader’s interest. Your first paragraph also does these things:

· establishes point of view
· creates the tone of the novel or the voice
· brings the main character on stage (not always, but usually)
· presents either the beginning of the story problem, or something intriguing that leads to it
· establishes setting, era, genre
· hooks the reader with story questions

Phew. Hardly surprising that writers rewrite their first page/first paragraph/first line so many times!

Let’s take something familiar as an example. The Three Little Pigs is a good example – whose point of view are we hearing? What kind of voice is it? What does the narrator tell you in just a few words? (My day improved immensely as soon as I saw those three plump little pigs being kicked out of their house by their mean old mother.)

You could start with the youngest pig (My favorite TV show had only just started when the old witch pulled me off the couch, yanked the pizza out of my hand and shoved me out the door!) or the mother (Those assertiveness classes were the best thing ever – finally I got the gumption to throw those lazy kids out). Every story has possibilities for how to start, and each possibility changes the story into something new.

If you have already written the story, you know everything that is about to happen. You already have your point of view character, you may even have their voice working well, but it can take a whole novel to get this right. Now you go back to Page 1 and start again.

There are a few things not to do. I see writers start with dialogue that has no identification of speakers and goes on for several lines, and they think they are being mysterious. Or they start with lengthy character description, so you'll know up front who this person is. If you start with setting description, you’d better have a good reason, and you’d better do it well!

The art of a stunning first line is a challenge to every writer, no matter what you write. David Sedaris starts one of his essays with:

"Well, that little experiment is over," my mother said.

Stuart MacBride starts Blind Eye with:

“Waiting was the worst bit: hunkered back against the wall, eyes squinting in the setting sun, waiting for the nod.”

What do great first lines have? A sense of place and character, even if not spelled out. A sense of tone, a smidgin of description. But very often they have a story question - a real one, not one that is trying to trick the reader. Joe Abercrombie starts Before They Are Hanged with:

“Damn mist. It gets in your eyes so you can't see no more than a few strides ahead.”

(OK, so it's a fragment and a sentence.) It's setting and tone and character all together - what kind of character says 'no more' and 'strides' rather than 'any further' and 'feet' or 'metres'?

I always feel like that first paragraph is a promise. It's no wonder people stand in bookshops and read first paragraphs and first pages. The first line draws them in, and the next lines keep them reading. As a writer, that’s your challenge. How can you make your first line, and then your next, and your next, something that will totally draw your reader into the story?

The truth is, great first lines are really hard. You might have to rewrite yours 20 or 50 times. But the bonus of getting it right is that the second one does become a little easier, and then so does the third. It’s as if you’ve managed to set up the essence and heart of both character and plot, and now you can start adding the bones and then the flesh.

Learn from the best, and perhaps even model your own on them. What do they contain? How does the writer achieve what they do? Yes, there are plenty that are mediocre. Yours doesn’t need to be. It shouldn’t be. Pull books off your shelf and compare, take notes, analyse.

What's the best first line you've read recently?

"Woman, Missing" shortlisted for the NZ Ngaio Marsh Awards - Best Novel

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Sun, 07 Sep 2025 02:06:00 +0000

Brilliant to discover last week that "Woman, Missing" has made the shortlist for the NZ crime fiction awards in Best Novel category.

Fingers crossed!

Links to buy all over.

CrimeFest 2025 - Bristol UK

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Fri, 27 Jun 2025 23:53:00 +0000

Lee Child, Fiona Veitch Smith, Linda Mather, Sherryl Clark (c) Sherryl Clark 2025

When I knew I was going to Europe, which initially was to attend a writing retreat, I checked what crime writing festivals were on at kind of the same time, and found CrimeFest in Bristol.

So the first thing I’d recommend is for you to do the same. Even if you aren’t planning to apply to be on a panel session, or aren’t published in that country, it’s great just to attend and meet other writers and readers. At some of the festivals and events, you could also meet publishers and agents.

For me, it helped a lot that my first crime novels were published in the UK, and I’ve been in contact with other people in the Crime writers’ Association. However, CrimeFest has a rule that if you are coming from overseas, they will put you on two panel sessions. Not all of them do this.

I ended up on three panels, and for one of them, I was the moderator. This turned out to be the opening session of the festival, and one of the panel members was Lee Child. So that made me a bit nervous, to say the least. Our topic was Private Investigators in crime fiction.

In the past I’ve compered a radio show called Writers at Work in Melbourne on 3CR – I did that for eight years, so I’ve interviewed probably 6-700 writers, and I also did Writers in Conversation events at the uni where I worked, so I know what to research, and what kinds of questions have been asked a million times. It’s a good challenge to come up with questions that are not the same old thing, but also not so silly or outrageous that nobody wants to answer them.

And I didn’t want to be the person who asked Lee Child a stupid question! The sessions were only 50 minutes so not much time, and most panels had four people plus moderator on them, so even less time! Anyway, Lee was very gracious and professional, as you would expect, and was happy to have photos taken with whoever wanted them, including me!

Questions I asked included: what two attributes do you think a PI (or your PI) must have; who would you like to play your character (obv Lee Child already has an actor for that but he said Alan does a great job); how far do you go with research to get it right; and is there anything that constrains your character in reality that you would like to do away with? Other panel members were Linda Mather, Fiona Veitch Smith and Christina Koning.

There was a massive bookshop in the ballroom, and one of the things I learned was how many writers in the UK write huge series, sometimes 15-20 books. I asked a few and they said their publishers expected it, if the first couple went well, you had to keep going.

I can tell you that’s not the case in Australia and NZ – your first one has to have done well before they will say yes to a sequel, and it seems for most writers that three is enough. There are always exceptions of course, but mostly that’s how it goes. I’ve been told that standalones often do better.

I was also on a panel talking about novels where someone in the family is a criminal or has a dark secret – so both of my novels fit into that. And I was lucky to be on a third panel which was about crime and mystery novels for teenagers. I met lots of writers and really enjoyed it all – 50 sessions over three full days, a program the size of a book, and came home with lots of free books as my table won the quiz night. It’s amazing how many books you can fit into a full suitcase if you are really determined!

How To Be a Successful Writer – Advice From 30 Years of Writing and Publishing

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Sun, 14 Jan 2024 02:46:00 +0000

I have never met a novelist, either in person or online, who doesn’t want to get their novel/s published. They might not come right out and say it, but you can tell. And it’s a valid dream. Why the hell not?

I was like that, too. And I got there in the end.

After so many years of writing and publishing, you’d think I could just sit back now and spin out the words and my books would be selling like hotcakes. Like 98% of writers, it’s not the case.

On the other hand, I do have 75 books published! So what gives?

Publishing is a business and it works on trends. Remember Twilight? Go The F** To Sleep? The Hunger Games? They all did fabulously well in their time – they hit their moment and took off. But they’re what the business world calls unicorns. Rarer than you think.

Some of my books have won awards, or been shortlisted. That helps a lot. But none have been huge bestsellers. Am I giving up? No. I’m buckling down and forging on, and continuing to do as many of these things as I possibly can. I think if you do them, too, you’ll eventually get there.

I. Keep learning and listen hard. I have always gone to conferences (when I can afford it), seminars, classes, and studied writing. I take advantage of free webinars offered by my writers’ associations, look for useful books and articles, go to writers’ and literary festivals.
I listen hard to what published authors say about their writing lives, their paths to publication, their publishing experiences. I don’t speak unless there is something I really want to ask that will be useful.

II. Look after your health. Too much coffee, alcohol, sugar, drugs – they might make you feel inspired, keep you writing far into the early hours, fuel your ideas – eventually they make your brain tired and depressed. You don’t sleep well. Your body complains. How can you focus then? I mean focus 100%. If there is one thing I have learned, it’s that giving my writing 100% is the only way to produce really good stuff. Yes, true.

III. Keep ideas notebooks. People say they do this, but do they truly? I have a notebook for each novel. I often get ideas for my current novel at odd times, and if I don’t write them down, they die. What’s more important is when I suddenly realize I have a plot hole, or a character glitch, or I have forgotten to set up an important clue. Then my notebook is vital.

IV. Take decent breaks. Don’t break for half an hour and take your novel with you to work on some editing, for example. Give your brain a total rest and do some gardening or go for a walk or have a power nap. When you finish a novel draft, go away for a long weekend if you can. Those breaks will mean you come back ready and fresh, and you will be surprised at what’s been going on in your brain that can’t wait to emerge.

V. Don’t try and write like everyone else. Oh boy, it took me years to learn to have confidence in my own voice. To stop self-censoring and thinking things like – that doesn’t sound literary enough. Write and write and find your own voice and then power it up with more writing.

VI. Stay off social media. You have a lot of creative energy. But it does run out each day, believe it or not. Do you want to spend the best part of it responding to idiots on SM? And the time! We say, “I’ll just spend ten minutes on Facebook” and suddenly it’s two hours later. Social media is a sinkhole. Leave it for when your creative energy is done and you can afford some silly time. (And yes, I know about marketing yourself etc, but again, is that more important than writing?)

VII. Read widely, read critically, but don’t use it as a procrastination tool. Same with research.

VIII. Write and submit small things. I’ve always written poetry and short stories, on and off. I’ve now got right back into flash fiction. I submit a lot more now that I used to, and write more of these things, because they make me feel good. It feels great to finish and rewrite them, and then submit, and it feels wonderful to get accepted for publication.
It also reminds me what it feels like to be rejected, and to shake it off and keep going. You need that perseverance for your novels as well. It’s good to learn it now.

IX. Don’t hang out with writers who whine a lot. Sure, getting published is hard. Sometimes it feels impossible. But if it was super easy, would you still want it? Part of getting published is validation. Other people think what you have written is darned good and they want others to read it. And they will pay you! How amazing is that?
But the downside is pretty rough. All the same, whining gets you nowhere, and hanging out with whiners actually pushes you backwards. It’s fine to have a rant for a few minutes, with writer friends who understand, but then you have to learn to move on and get stuck into your writing again. Whining drains your energy.

X. This is the tough one. Don’t self-publish just because you have had a hundred rejections. You know what? A hundred rejections, almost all of the time, is telling you something. Your book isn’t good enough yet. Yes, there are a lot of writers who self-publish and do OK, but the really successful ones? They’re unicorns, too.
Use those rejections as a spur – pay for a professional critique, if you can. If you use beta readers, you HAVE to find ones that are experienced and can tell you what’s wrong. What is the point of beta readers who can’t tell you which bits suck? And how to fix them?

So there they are – my ten bits of advice, gleaned from many years of writing, reading, listening, thinking and being tough on myself. I don’t write every day, but I write most days, even if it’s only a few hundred words. I guess that is No. 11 – write. That’s what writers do, isn’t it?

Trust your gut: how a Debut Dagger longlisting led to a publishing deal

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Tue, 19 Sep 2023 02:45:00 +0000

People often ask me where the initial idea for “Trust Me, I’m Dead” came from, and I talk about an article I read many years ago where one snippet caught my eye, and then stuck in my brain. It was a small thing, about a man who’d left behind a tape of secrets that his family knew nothing about. I kept that article but of course now I can’t find it!

The first draft was written back in 2008, I think, and a few people read it over the years, giving me all kinds of feedback. “The voice is too YA”, “It’s not dark enough”, “It’s a fast read – too fast”. Although I didn’t always agree, I knew within each comment was a kernel of truth, feedback that went deeper than fixing grammar and punctuation. So what do you do? You keep revising, deepening, working in complexity.

And then along the way, because it still wasn’t right but the characters well and truly had their teeth into me, I started a sequel and wrote about 30,000 words. My writers’ group read most of it, and wanted more, but other things got in the way. I was teaching and studying, but I rewrote “Trust Me’ yet again. And I saw the ads for the CWA Debut Dagger. I wasn’t ready. The book wasn’t ready!

I had been writing children’s books for quite a few years. They were short, sometimes only the length of a short story, or a long poem if it was a picture book. My adult novels had taken a back seat all along.

Life changes. My writing changed. Perhaps it was the academic writing I did while I was studying, but when I revised “Trust Me” again, I felt more in charge of the sentences and I had more confidence in Judi, my main character, and her voice. This, I decided, was how she wanted to tell her story, no matter what. I would trust my gut and keep at it. Then I went and did one of those coaching courses that showed me it was time to get off my rear end and try – seriously try with this manuscript. The coach’s advice? Yep, stop f****g around. (Thanks, Craig Harper.)

When I entered the Debut Dagger, what I really hoped for was to be shortlisted (never mind winning!). The opportunity to get the judges’ feedback and also have my novel put in front of a number of UK agents and publishers was crucial to me. What I didn’t expect was that when the novel was longlisted, the news was reported in the Australian Bookseller & Publisher, and several Australian publishers jumped in and asked to read it.

Some said no, or sat on it for ages. But Verve Books asked to read the whole manuscript after I was shortlisted, and were so enthusiastic that I knew they would be great to work with. I signed up for a two-book deal and “Trust Me, I’m Dead” was published in July 2019. It’s all been absolutely brilliant.

And that sequel? Well, it was initially lost, and then I found about 80% of it in files on an old USB. So now my writers’ group (and eventually everyone else) will find out what happened to the body in the dumpster!

The basics of book contracts, part 3 - the promises made and what they mean

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Wed, 12 Apr 2023 01:26:00 +0000

So you have a book contract. Wonderful! And you’ve looked at the key elements I’ve talked about so far — licencing, termination clause, advances and royalties — things that will benefit you if you get them right.

But what about the promises — often called “warranties” in your parts of your contract? And the guarantees the publisher makes to you? Because this is a legal contract, and if you break any of these promises, you might find yourself in a load of trouble.

Warning: I am not a lawyer or an agent, so what I say here is not legal advice. It’s knowledge and experience from 25+ years of book contracts, and too many writers are ignorant of things that could cost them a lot. Or even everything.

What you promise the publisher

Let’s start with the first thing you promise them — the date you will hand over the final edited draft of the manuscript, after you have worked with their editor. Whether you have disputes with the editor or not (and it’s a good idea to avoid this or sort it out early), publishers usually create a schedule for publishing your book that starts with the publication date and works backwards.

If you hand in your final draft two months late, you stuff up their whole schedule. They might have decided your book should come out in early October to gain Christmas sales. You being two months late means they’ll be struggling to get your book out there by early December, and will be pretty upset at missing two months of sales.

Of course you can’t avoid catastrophes, but if something like that happens, you will have to talk to them pronto. Just not handing over the manuscript by the due date means you have broken the contract. Communication is key.

Warranties are also your promises

Now for the section called warranties. Firstly, you warrant that the work belongs to you and you are entitled to enter into the contract. You also warrant that you own the copyright, and the book has not been previously published in the territories you are contracting for.

BUT you also warrant that the work is original — that means you wrote it. Now, to the best of my knowledge, nobody is seeing a clause under warranties YET that specifically says your original work has not been written with the use of AI or ChatGPT. But it would not surprise me if it’s coming.

(I think the use of AI is going to bring quite a few changes to this section of the contract, and you will have to be on your toes about what it means for you. Look at the legal outcomes — and what you might have to prove.)

You also warrant that in writing your work, you didn’t use anyone else’s work and present it as your own. Everyone talks about academic writing and quoting properly to avoid plagiarism, but this happens even in novel writing. A recent example is a novel shortlisted for a prestigious prize that turned out to be not the author’s work.

What would happen if you did this? Apart from your book being pulped and your reputation shredded? Your publisher may require you to return your advance, and they may decide to sue you.

The same could happen if you break your contract because of another warranty — the one where you warrant that you have not included anything libelous, defamatory or obscene. You wouldn’t think this would apply to fiction, but there have been cases of not-so-carefully disguised “revenge” characters where the real person can be identified.

In non-fiction, this can be a real issue, especially in biographies, and you also have to warrant that you have not included anything that can cause harm (statement, advice, information, instruction, recipe, formula etc). Sure, books inciting hatred are published — this is the nasty world we live in now — but those publishers would already understand what risks they are taking. However, if anything went really pear-shaped, guess who would get blamed?

And the ultimate clause that follows the warranties? That the author will indemnify the publisher against any loss, damage or injury caused by breaching those warranties.

And by the way, if you do use material or words that belong to someone else, where you can get permission for the use so it’s all legal — you have to pay the permissions fee. That can cost you hundreds or thousands of dollars. It’s a clause you really need to negotiate if you are in this position. It’s why editors tell writers not to use song lyrics, for example. Two lines of a famous song can cost you $2000 (which happened to a friend — who decided to make up her own lyrics for the story instead).

Now, what does the publisher promise you?

Firstly, that they will publish your book AT THEIR OWN EXPENSE within a certain date. It can be six months or twelve months from the date of contract signing. It might be longer, depending on the book.

I’ve capitalized “at their own expense” because this is important — when you are being scammed by a vanity publisher, you won’t see this promise, because they’re going to make you pay for almost everything. If your book is being traditionally published, by a genuine publisher, they pay for publishing costs, including editing, design, printing and distribution.

If you are presented with a contract where you are being asked or expected to pay ANYTHING, then please get proper legal advice, from a writers’ organization or an arts lawyer. I once had a student come to me very excited at receiving a publisher’s offer for their picture book — all they had to do was pay the publisher 8000 pounds. No. That’s a scam.

The publisher also promises to publish the book in a professional manner — so that includes good editing, page and cover design, blurbs etc. You may be consulted about covers etc, but don’t expect to have the final say. They do (and they usually know a lot better than you what the market is and how to present the book).

They also promise to market and sell the book in a professional manner, trying to get you as many sales as they possibly can. Here, you need to understand that the marketing budget is also out of your hands. If you are a debut author, you may get extra in the budget, especially if you or your book has an “angle” that can be promoted.

I would add here, too, that some contracts will stipulate that you make yourself available for publicity and marketing — this might mean speaking at writers’ festivals, doing interviews on various media, doing appearances at events. If you are afraid of public speaking, you may need to find a way to get over this, or discuss it with them first.

I have not seen any contracts that stipulate you must do your own marketing via social media, but there is certainly an expectation that you try. Some authors are really good at this. Most at least give it a try. We do our best. But if you do want to engage more on SM, start now, and get your website sorted ASAP as well.

The takeaway from all of this

A contract is exciting. But it is also a legal document, enforceable in court, so it’s a good idea for you to look at these sections of your contract and understand exactly what they mean for you and your book.

Part 1 of these articles looks at licencing, copyright, termination clauses. Part 2 looks at the money — advances, royalties etc.

This article was first published by me on Medium. https://medium.com/@sherrylclark/why-you-need-to-know-the-basics-of-a-traditional-book-contract-part-3-promises-promises-37526c0e4409

Continuing the basics of books contracts - "show me the money"

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Wed, 12 Apr 2023 01:24:00 +0000

This second article on book contracts is going to deal with the money, or in other words, what you are likely to get paid when you have book accepted for publication, and what you might expect (vs what you might hope for). First article is here — read first if you can.

Warning: I am not a lawyer or an agent, so what I say here is not legal advice. It’s knowledge and experience from 25+ years of book contracts, and too many writers are ignorant of things that could cost them a lot. Or even everything.

Many people (not just writers) don’t realize that the advance you receive when you sign a book contract is exactly that — an advance on future earnings. So if you receive a $2000 advance for your book, you won’t receive another cent until the publisher has sold enough books to cover your advance.

Thus, if your book is selling for $20 (as an example, for easy math), and your royalty is 10%, that means you will receive — on paper — $2 for every book sold. Your publisher would need to sell a thousand copies of your book for you to “earn out” your advance. If the book is still selling, you will start receiving royalty payments.

RRP — what is it?

The above example is based on Recommended Retail Price. Theoretically, this is what your book will sell for in most bookshops. However, if your publisher does a deal with BigBookChain X to sell them 1000 copies at deep discount, that might mean instead of you receiving $2 each for that 1000 copies, you might only receive 80 cents. So instead of $2000, you’ll get $800. (You may or may not see deep discount mentioned in your contract.)

Your sales will look better, but you are a bit further from earning out. You will very likely have a different rate of royalty for the e-book version of your book. Instead of selling for $20 as print, the e-book might be selling for $4.99.

So while your contract might say that you will get 30% royalty for each e-book sold, that actually means just over $1.49. And if your publisher does a special promotion of your e-book for 99 cents, well, that could mean just over 29 cents per book. It’s not that your publisher is trying to do you out of money — this is a common method of promotion now, and probably works out cheaper than advertising campaigns or book tours.

So what does Net Receipts mean?

Net receipts is what the publisher receives from the distributor. Some publishers do their own distribution, but it’s common for them to use commercial distributors, who get the book into shops etc and fulfill orders. A pretty standard discount for distributors is 40%, but it can be as high as 60% depending on the arrangement and what the distributor allows the bookshops as a discount.

Already you can see that if you are being paid per book on net receipts, the pot can become small fairly quickly. Your $20 book sold at 40% discount would garner the publisher $12, and from that they have to pay you, but also pay their print and marketing costs etc. Still, if you accept 10% of net receipts as your royalty, your portion of the book’s sale drops from $2 down to $1.20.

This is why, if your publisher insists on net receipts, you need to insist on at least 17% to earn that $2. For an e-book, you want at least 30% royalty on net receipts, and the closer to 40% the better. And for many new authors, the idea of negotiating for a better royalty sends them into a spin. We get back to that whole thing of being so grateful your book is accepted that you sign without working out the figures.

Why a Huge Advance is Not Always Wonderful

Remember that term — earning out? When the publisher does all their work on estimating the market for your book, which in turn means how many copies they think they can sell, a number of elements come into it.

Firstly, they calculate costs, and your royalty rate comes into it as well. If they decide your book is a hot topic (or they believe with marketing they can create you and your book as “hot”), they’ll be planning for a lot more sales than 2000. It’s an investment. In-house costs (editing, design, proofreading, marketing, special cover treatments etc) tend to be straightforward for them to calculate. Although to make your book “hot” they will probably allocate a much higher amount to marketing.

If they had to beat off some other publishers to get your book (we all wish for this to happen), then they have very likely already done the calculations — what it is going to cost them to publish — and have set a limit on what they will pay as an advance. It reverberates all the way down the chain, including things like reducing other authors’ book marketing budgets in order to pay for yours.

So let’s say that you’ve been offered a $50,000 advance for your book. Champagne! Meanwhile, at the publishing company, they’re likely to also be celebrating this hot new book they’ve acquired, and then doing all of their calculations again.

When your hangover wears off, do your own calculations. Let’s stick with the $20 RRP to make it easy. Your book now has to sell 25,000 copies for you to earn out your advance.

Here’s a little reality check. On average a book published in the USA sells 300 print copies. When you include e-book and audio sales, it’s about 1000. (Source) There are very few books that sell 10,000 copies. Very few. And even fewer that would get to 25,000. Yours might be one of them, if your publisher’s campaign works.

We’ve all heard of books that come out of nowhere and sell hugely (Where the Crawdads Sing anyone?). But your book? Who knows? It might. It more likely might not. So instead of earning out and making your publisher a bundle of money, let’s say your book did quite well and sold 10,000 copies. You will still be $30,000 short of earning out your advance.

Will your publisher want to take a chance on another book from you? Especially if you only got lukewarm reviews and no shortlistings for any awards? Hmmm. These days, maybe not.

So I should be grateful for a $4000 advance?

Not necessarily. Remember that marketing and publicity department? The lower your advance and the less “hot” your book is, the lower the budget for marketing.

If you can get a higher advance, the publisher is likely to spend more money on marketing because that way, they are keener to get their investment back and hopefully make a profit. It’s like a balancing act in a way, and you as the author are part of it. It’s a key reason why agents are worth their commission. A good agent is going to do their best to get you a bigger advance, which will not only cover their commission but also get your book better marketing dollars.

If you don’t have an agent, try thinking about it this way. How many hours have you spent writing your book? What value do you put on your creation? Do you want to keep writing and want to see enough of a return to maybe drop your work hours to part-time, for instance? If you do some sums on the publisher’s offer, it might just give you the courage to go back to the table and ask for more. It’s your writing career and future books at stake.

It is possible to go online and research what book advances have been paid, or you can ask around. Advances in the USA are usually much bigger than Australia, for example. Do your homework here and it will be very useful. Writers are notorious for keeping the money stuff secret and it doesn’t help — knowledge is power in negotiations.

Big warning here! If you get a letter of offer that stipulates the advance and royalties in the letter — in writing — be very careful. Signing or agreeing to that letter of offer can be binding for the contract and give you NO room to negotiate.

OK, that’s probably enough for this article. Your head might be spinning by now. But get out your calculator and do some sample sums yourself. If you have book contracts you have signed, go back and look at your advance and royalties, whether you’re on RRP or net receipts, and what your book actually sold for in the bookshops. It’s a very good exercise!

By the way, as a heads-up from Article 1, if you made the mistake of selling your copyright in your book, none of this is relevant. What you received when you signed the contract is it. No more money ever again.

(And as I said up front, I’m not an agent or a legal expert. Just pointing stuff out I’ve learned.) This article was first published on Medium - https://medium.com/@sherrylclark/why-you-need-to-know-the-basics-of-book-contracts-part-2-show-me-the-money-c171e099f01

Why You Need to Know the Basics of a Book Contract If You Want to be Traditionally Published

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Wed, 12 Apr 2023 00:39:00 +0000

Here’s a word you might have heard — boilerplate. And here’s a term — termination clause. If you don’t know what either of them mean, I’m going to explain — and more.

It’s astonishing how little is understood about book contracts. Not all of this is the writer’s fault. Some publishers deliberately create 50-page contracts full of jargon to bamboozle you. They don’t want you to ask questions. They want you to sign and shut up. (That’s why good agents are worth their percentage, by the way. Good agents don’t shut up, and they shouldn’t get bamboozled.)

I was incredibly lucky — when I received my very first book contract, another writer with a ton of experience and knowledge took me through it, clause by clause, and explained everything, as well as what I should be asking for. I will be forever grateful to him. I had to negotiate more than twenty contracts on my own, and it was pretty nervewracking at times. But knowing what I was entitled to, and understanding what the parts of the contract meant, made all the difference.

I have since had agents, but I still read every contract and discuss it with my agent so nothing is missed and we are on the same page about what to ask for.

This knowledge is important. Without it, you could lose a lot, including the rights to your own book. So here is some of what I have learned to share with you.

Boilerplate

This is the name given to the publisher’s standard contract. This contract almost always favors the publisher. It gives them a higher percentage of many of the rights that can be sold. It often has no termination clause. It can also waiver your moral rights, and put the onus back on you if anyone sues.

In other words, never sign the boilerplate contract. How do you know that’s what it is? Because it will be the first one they offer you, expecting you to be so excited that you will sign without even reading it. I know quite a few authors who have literally done this. And been sorry.

One author signed away her copyright, not just on that book but the next one she had agreed to write for them. When the first book sold and sold, she never got another cent. An illustrator signed away everything for a flat fee rather than royalties and rights payments, so when the books became bestsellers and the publisher produced merchandise using the illustrations, the illustrator got nothing.

Publishers will say that they don’t deliberately set out to swindle you. But the fact remains that almost every boilerplate contract will have clauses that are in their favor which take money away from you.

Copyright and licencing

One of the very first clauses will be about “licencing the copyright” to the publisher. This is NOT the same as granting or selling the publisher your copyright — if you do that, you lose any rights whatsoever to the book from there on.

Generally, you licence the publisher. It will read something like this: The Author hereby grants to the publisher the exclusive licence to publish the Work in volume form (including electronic book, audio book and omnibus book form).

It will probably also stipulate the territory — in Australia, many publishers want world rights so they can sell the right to publish in other territories. It’s different in different countries (and if you have a good agent with overseas connections, he/she might limit the territories).

Where people get confused is over what the licencing means, because often this clause has another part that talks about duration — the licence shall be for the legal term of copyright plus any extensions. So they assume that is the same as selling their copyright.

Not so.

The termination clause limits the licence

You have to have a good termination clause to go with the licencing clause, and this termination clause may be much further into the contract. Without it, the publisher can insist that as long as the book is available as an e-book, it is still “in print”. Even if it isn’t selling, and hasn’t for ages, you can’t request a return of rights without “out of print” being defined to your advantage.

Once upon a time, before e-books, out of print usually meant it was no longer available to buy (they’d sold them all) or the book had sold less than 50 copies in a 6-month royalty period. You wrote a letter requesting a reprint, and if they didn’t want to reprint, they returned the rights to you. E-books have messed with this “out of print” clause.

I have contracts now where there is a “low sales” clause that covers this as effectively OOP after a minimum period of time. But the termination clause should also cover what happens if the company goes out of business. It needs to stipulate, as well, that if either party doesn’t comply with the contract, then the contract is terminated and rights returned to the author. This might include not publishing the book within the specified time, or the author not delivering the manuscript by the date it is contracted for. It works for both of you.

Finally, if the book does stop selling and your rights are returned to you, make sure you have an official “reversion of rights” letter, and keep hard copies of it as well. I was lucky that when a small publisher I had a book with was sold to a larger publisher, and I had asked the small publisher for my rights back first, I had printed out the email for my files. It was my only evidence, as my computer had died, but it was enough that the big publisher had to pay me some money they had inaccurately received for the title.

Your book is not just your pride and joy. It is also a product with various rights that can be sold, and you never know what might happen — so learn what it all means and how to protect what you have created.

I’ll write about other important clauses in the next article (Part 2 — the money).

(And remember, if you need legal advice, either find an agent or look for an arts lawyer. Not the lawyer your mom used for her will!)

This article first published by me on Medium - https://medium.com/@sherrylclark/why-you-need-to-know-the-basics-of-a-book-contract-if-you-want-to-be-traditionally-published-782514c78f7e

"Bowl the Maidens Over" - the perfect gift for cricket fans!

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Sat, 18 Dec 2021 22:46:00 +0000

I asked author Louise Zedda-Sampson to tell me about her book - the story of research and publication is fascinating! Thanks, Louise.

What inspired you to write this book? You mention finding a story while researching – tell us about that.

When I was completing my Diploma of Professional Writing and Editing in 2015 at Melbourne Polytechnic, the course coordinator asked me if I’d be interested in doing some pro bono work for a local cricket club, researching and writing about the club history. Any experience in a new field is good experience, so even though I had no real interest in cricket, I jumped at the chance. My first published piece in 2013 was a case study and research article on spelling called: ‘Is U a word or do you spell it with a Z: English spelling in Australian schools--are we getting it write?’, published by the Australian Literacy Educators’ Association. I’ve always loved research.

In researching the club’s history – it was the Youlden Parkville Cricket Club, and it has quite a history of its own – I found all these other fragments of stories, and when I tried to find out more about them (for my own interest) there was little available because the full stories had not been written. One was about a person called David Scott who helped foster junior cricket in Melbourne, and who was also instrumental in bringing the English cricketers to Australia in the late 1800s. I wrote about this missing history in a piece called ‘The Cup, the Cricket and the Custodians’ and it was published by Melbourne Cricket Club Library in their publication called The Yorker. Another story was of the first women’s games of cricket. The fact these important stories were missing from the history books was my impetus to write them. Such enormous achievements had to be celebrated – even if it was a hundred plus years later.

I have a few more such stories up my sleeve but they aren’t on paper yet so I won’t talk about them!

Whose idea was it for two women’s teams to play that day? Was it difficult to organize? What obstacles did they face?

Oh this is a very big question! For context, the game was held at the Sandhurst (now Bendigo) Easter Fair as a fundraiser for the Bendigo Hospital and Asylum. There’s a bit of contention around whose idea it was! In the book I’ve said that it was John Rae’s idea. He was a headmaster and husband of Emily Rae, and father to Nellie and Barbara Rae. A newspaper account states John Rae had approached the clergy to play in a ‘muff match’ for the Easter Fair, but they declined, and then he asked the ladies. The family records held by one of the descendants of Nellie Rae – Chris Cordner – state that it was Emily Rae’s idea to have the women play. Perhaps it was a bit of both.

It did not seem difficult to organise. Advertisements were run in the local Bendigo Advertiser newspaper for a few weeks and teams were established. Permission was granted for the women to train and use the facilities of the Bendigo United Cricket Club (BUCC) where they were coached and mentored by some of Australia’s finest cricket players of the time. There was a lot of local support and enthusiasm for the event. A few reports suggested that watching the ladies train may have been more of a novelty entertainment rather than it being for any sporting prowess, but not a lot was written so it’s very hard to gauge how well they were publicly supported before the game. However, as the day of the game neared, the ‘Ladies’ cricket match’ became more prominent a feature in the Fair advertisements, and on the day of the parade they all wore their uniforms and rode in ornate carriages as part of the procession. The only obstacles they seemed to face in the build up to the game was about the type of costumes they would wear, and if they were really going to consider the ‘dreadful’ bloomer costume over something neck-to ankle!

The real obstacles started once the game had been played, when all of a sudden attention turned on the women rather than the game.

You’ve gathered a lot of newspaper reportage, much of it quite rude, about the first cricket match. Were you horrified to read some of it? (I was!)

A lot of it was terrible. Scathing in fact! It was one of the things that really pushed me on to write this story. When I read the articles that demeaned the women so badly, and I realised how they had continued in spite of all of it, I felt a real sense of pride in these ladies – playing in those conditions, that took guts. And it made me want to pay tribute to their story.

The Maryborough and Dunolly Advertiser had very strong views about a woman’s place and had no qualms about voicing them. A woman’s place was in the home – clearly! – and to be playing a ‘manly’ sport in front of a male audience was likened to a burlesque performance. Slurs were made about the character of the women players. This view was also supported by other Melbourne papers such as The Herald, while the local papers in Bendigo help firm in supporting the women cricketers instead.

A short extract from an article in The Maryborough and Dunolly Advertiser dated 13 April 1874:

TWO-AND-TWENTY females in white calico skirts, blue and red Garibaldi jackets, and sailor hats, played a cricket match in the Camp Reserve, Sandhurst, on Easter Monday in the presence of a considerable concourse of spectators, who paid an entrance fee to witness this unbecoming spectacle.

Fifty years ago, such an exhibition could not have taken place without subjecting all the actresses in it to general scorn and reprobation. But women are falling so rapidly into contempt, and are becoming so unsexed, that such an event as the one referred to excited no more reprehension than does the appearance on the stage of females in a condition nearly bordering on nudity as they can go to without exciting absolute loathing and disgust.

This unfeminine trial of masculine skill at Sandhurst, in which frisky matrons took part with forward spinsters, was engaged as—we are told in the cause of “heaven-born charity.” Nothing else could extort money from the pockets of the male public, but this unwomanly exhibition on a public holiday.

Doesn’t it make you cross? What was worse was one of the local agitators in Bendigo anonymously slipped it into the letterbox of Barbara Rae. Barbara was a captain of one team and the secretary for the match. I think it was reading this article that really made me see red. I had to go to the State Library to get a copy of this particular article because the newspaper records had not been digitised for The Maryborough and Dunolly Advertiser. Prior to seeing the article, I had suspected it was vicious by the other commentary I’d seen printed, but I had no idea how nasty until I read it. So, yes, I was just like you, Sherryl – horrified!

You decided to self-publish the book, and it’s a beautiful little hardback in its first edition. Why self-publish, why hardback, and what was the process like?

Thanks, Sherryl! There are lots of factors in here. I’ll start with the decision to self-publish. I started the process by entering the draft in a few writing competitions because I wasn’t sure what format it should take or how I’d manage all the information, and even though it was undiscovered Australian history, no one was interested. Maybe my applications were terrible, or the assessors didn’t find the subject interesting, whoever knows. Not being deterred, I contacted the Melbourne Cricket Club Library to see if they would another story and they said yes, so I found a way to make it work. It was published it in The Yorker in 2019, the summer before the 2020 women’s T20 at the MCG, and copies of the magazine were reprinted for the monumental game. But after this the story didn’t seem to go anywhere, and as time passed, I felt there was more to do on it.

At the beginning of 2021 – after the terrible year of 2020 with Melbourne lockdowns, a broken ankle (not recommended) and my mother dying – I decided this year had to include something significant and positive, so I embarked on the process of self-publishing the book so the story could reach a wider audience. I didn’t even try to pitch to publishers because I wanted to get it published hopefully in time for the 2021 Bendigo Easter Fair (which was also cancelled due to covid anyway!). Was this a good idea or not? I’m not sure. My advice has always been to try publishers first before self-publishing, and I go and do the opposite!

Re the format. My typesetter and cover designer, Lorna Hendry, suggested I consider hardback. When I got a sample of each – a paperback and a hardback – the hardback just suited the book. It felt and looked right, like something that fitted the period of the story. One of the issues with that, of course, is that it’s more expensive to produce and therefore it costs more to sell. One thing that’s a real issue is that I can’t get distribution on the book and get it into bookstores because the distribution discount would have me sell the book at a loss. This is something to look at as a factor in self-publishing when you print a hardback.

The process itself was eye-opening! I’ve edited plenty of books, but somehow having your own work go through the publication process is different. For instance, references have never been a strong point and I had to check my own many, many times. I found the whole self-publishing through Ingram a bit intimidating, to be honest, and had to ask a lot of questions in Facebook groups about how to set things up and what to select. In hindsight, I recommend doing a self-publishing course before you start a self-publishing project. I did find the set-up aspect very stressful.

I have managed all of that now, but I haven’t ventured into the e-book side as yet. That’s further down the track. One thing I think it’s important to mention here is to make sure you engage professionals to help you if you are self-publishing. I had no idea what could be done until I was shown, and I’ve learnt so much.

Now that the book has been launched, what have been the best and most challenging things about the whole project?

The launch happened five months after the book was released, delay due to covid. It’s so funny, really. The thing that got me moving also held me up. It was hard to promote things online, with many other authors yelling for space on the airwaves, understandably too, and I didn’t want to be another voice yelling into a saturated crowd. Getting into bookstores has been incredibly hard with shop closures and market uncertainty, and no distributor. I’m basically on sale through a few stockists, my shop and online. So, the most challenging thing for me was how to sell the book in the circumstances. I’m still working that out.

I’ll say another challenge was the media – to start. I hadn’t done an interview before, and I am sure the first few I did were just awful! Luckily, they weren’t live. And by the time I did do a live one, I’d done a few already. I’m not sure anything prepares you for that.

The best things are a mix of administrative things and feel-good things. Being in control of the whole printing process is pretty satisfying. Even though it’s cost me to pay for editing, typesetting and cover art, it’s been worth it to have a professionally finished product. I also like having a shop because it adds another level of variety to my writerly experience.

Another positive about the whole project was linking with people who really got what I was writing. Dennis Johansen of the Bendigo Historic Society facilitated the meeting with the City of Greater Bendigo who hosted my book launch because he had a passion for the story too.

The ultimate highlight thus far has been the actual launch, and for a variety of reasons. It was held in the historic Bendigo Town Hall – a building built in the 1880s not long after the first cricket match, and only a short stroll from where the first game was played. The City of Greater Bendigo Mayor Andrea Metcalf opened the launch and Councillor Margaret O’Rourke was the MC, and many councillors were in attendance. There was a great sense of pride in the celebration of the first women’s games and it was a real honour to be a part of bringing that history home.

Also, sharing this story with the descendants of the Rae women was great. After Gideon Haigh wrote a review in The Australian, I was able to make contact with some of the descendants directly. Having the Cordners from the line of Nellie Rae and the Potters from the line of Barbara Rae in attendance at the launch was also a massive source of joy for me. Stephen Cordner even got up and said a few words as well. The launch also attracted some cricketing celebrities – Janice Parker and Ann Gordon, women cricketers who had represented Australia. Catherine Mcleod, President of the Pioneers Association – a group dedicated to preserving women’s cricket history – was there too. There were also many others with an interest in the game and the history. Plus, so many of my family and friends.

One gentleman told me – after reading my book – that even though he was familiar with many of the articles I’d referenced, he'd not viewed the games from how the women might have perceived them before. This is also a major highlight for me. Writing about these stories brings awareness and awareness brings change.

Books can be purchased directly online through my shop https://louisezeddasampson.com.au/product/bowl-the-maidens-over-our-first-women-cricketers/

or if you prefer to buy instore or elsewhere, please check the Stockist link on my website https://louisezeddasampson.com.au/stockists/

Louise Zedda-Sampson is a Melbourne-based writer, researcher and award-nominated editor. She writes nonfiction and speculative and literary short fiction. Her writing has appeared in peer-reviewed journals, online, and in magazines and anthologies, and under her own imprint LZS Press. Find Louise at www.louisezeddasampson.com.au and on Twitter at @I_say_meow

"Izzy" by Moira McAlister - historical fiction and "taking liberties"!

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Sat, 04 Dec 2021 00:27:00 +0000

I've worked with a few writers in the past two years who have written novels based on real people in their family tree. So how many "liberties" can you take - or do you have to leap off into fiction in order to make the story zing? Moira has written a novel that is even more fascinating when you know it's based on a real woman.

What inspired you to write this book? How did you go about doing all of your research?

There are two distinct parts to the writing of this book. Izzy is historical fiction based on facts that I discovered while researching the life and deeds of my great, great grandfather, which I published as a website in 2015 Dr Barry Cotter: the first doctor in Melbourne (drbarrycotter.com) His was an interesting life, full of action and adventure and very well documented through the Historical Records of Victoria, numerous newspaper articles, shipping and appointment lists, official correspondence, references in histories of the time and private records of various types, including an obscure, pantomime style production called ‘A Satirical Manuscript’, held in the State Library of Victoria.

I spent five years collecting and sifting through these pieces of evidence and finally felt I was able to write his story. I chose to present it as a website for a number of reasons. Firstly, and most importantly, because a website is easily edited and I have been able to change or add information as it comes to light. Secondly, it would be freely available to family members and others who are interested. Thirdly, one advantage of the website is that I was able to link ‘research pages’ to each chapter of the story, so that all my sources and references are easily accessible, but not cluttering the main body of the work. And lastly, I was able to add links to interesting people, places and events if the reader cared to follow up on anything in particular. The end result, to me, is a vibrant, full account of Dr Cotter’s life, almost like a living thing, because it keeps growing and changing over the six years since I first published it.

But back to Izzy. Like most women of the 19^th century, Dr Barry Cotter’s wife, Inez, left very little evidence of her life. She appears as an ‘add on’ in various accounts, is mentioned on shipping lists with him, in their marriage certificate of course, in the birth records of their four children, in a few newspaper reports and PROV holds two letters that she wrote. These entries are all fairly routine and dull, but there were also several very tantalizing facts that I found which pointed to a woman whom I could not ignore and I knew that if I was going to write about her, it would have to be fiction. The facts were like lampposts on a dark road, illuminating just a small space around them. I could see the next lamppost in the distance but needed to employ plausible and well researched, but fictitious, characters and actions, to get there. This is the image that sustained me throughout the writing.

Any funny or weird stories?

In the course of my research, I became familiar with the original plan of the Melbourne grid; that iconic plan of straight streets and square blocks, that so defines Melbourne. It was used as the basis for the first land sales in Melbourne on June 1^st, 1837. I knew that Dr Barry Cotter had purchased Block 11 Section 12, the south west corner of Bourke and Swanston Street (Oh! If only he had kept it!). His name was printed on the original document along with others who bought the 100 blocks on offer that day. On first seeing this document, you can imagine my surprise, to find, on the same piece of paper, the name Lachlan Macalister, a kinsman of my husband’s family, a man whose life I had also researched. That the two of them were present at the same place, at the same time made me think that they probably met. I guess they would never have thought that their two families would be joined in later years.

I enjoyed writing that scene in Izzy, not only because of the improbability of it, but also because both men were typical of the purchasers on the day. Cotter was keen to make Melbourne his home and grew rich on land deals in the growing town. Macalister was a sheep farmer ready to expand into this new region, a hard businessman, known for his lack of tolerance for the Indigenous people. His blocks in Flinders Street were for warehouses to store wool for export.

How difficult was it to write about someone who was a family member? At what point did you decide to write a novel rather than a biography? Why?

The most freeing action I took in writing this novel was to change her name from Inez to Izzy. Perhaps it was because of the amount of research I had done, and my determination to tell Dr Barry Cotter’s story as fact, that I felt bound by her Inez-ness. Once I began to think of her as Izzy, suddenly all sorts of possibilities opened up for me to explore and the work took on a different life, a life of its own, just touching base with the facts at certain points in the story. By writing drbarrycotter.com as a narrative non-fiction, I felt that I had covered all the biographical details of both Barry and Inez that were available. I wanted though, to tell her story. Although so much of the work is fiction, I feel that it is plausible fiction.

The research I did for Izzy was not so much about her, as I had already gathered as much as possible beforehand. The research for the novel was about the world she lived in – broad aspects like the places, times, events, people, the role of women, class differences, social mores etc and the specifics such as child care practices, particular inventions, medicinal treatments, common foods, ship board life, fashion and dozens of other details that I felt had to be ‘right’ to maintain the authenticity of the story.

What do you think you have learned along the way that you would pass on to others treading the same path?

Family history is always a matter of conjecture and often of heated discussion. My experience showed me that you can do it in two ways – either as a documented, well-researched biography or narrative non-fiction, which will stand the scrutiny of anyone who cares to inspect it. Or, declare that it is fiction and use the facts to anchor it, but not bog it down. Change people’s names to free yourself from being enslaved to the facts of time, place, action and events.

You decided to self-publish the book, but did you consider sending it to commercial publishers or agents first? If so, what happened? What has the process been like?

Yes, I did approach traditional publishers and the answer is – nothing happened. I came close to a contract four or five times, but in the end, after a roller-coaster of hopes dashed, it all came to naught. Once I made the decision to self-publish, the whole process changed. It became a joy! I went with a small self-publishing company, IndieMosh, which is situated in the Blue Mountains. The communication skills, professionalism, expertise and experience of this company made the process a dream come true.

I was in charge at every step, from the cover to the internal layout, to the font, from the page colour to the headings. Every detail was discussed. And when the final proof was ready, after many delays on my part and much patience on their part, they did all the technical aspects such as uploading to Ingram, helped with author pages on Amazon, Smashwords and the IndieMosh website, organized royalties and dozens of other technical and specific tasks that I had no idea about.

What have been the most challenging things – and the most enjoyable?

Challenging? Probably the editing. Anyone who knows me, knows that I have always been a confident writer, sure in my understanding of grammar, certain in spelling, at ease with punctuation. I was educated at a time when these skills were important and have taught them myself in primary school for many years. So, I was shocked to see the number of mistakes which the final professional proof read found. I cannot stress enough the importance of having other eyes read your work – lots of other eyes -manuscript readers and professional editors will assess your work in terms of readability, structure, flow, plot points, character development, language etc. They will also see the typos, misspellings and missing words which you glaze over but which are so glaringly obvious to the reader.

Enjoyable? The satisfaction of having done what I set out to do. Telling this story as fiction gave me the freedom to explore the motivation behind the actions which are recorded as fact. Shipping lists, marriage certificates and census records only tell so much. For example, our 21^st century mentality tells us that a marriage certificate meant a couple were in love. However, in early Melbourne (1835- 1837) men outnumbered women by 20 to 1, so there were many reasons for people to marry – security and respectability for women, housekeeping and companionship for men. Love was not always the prompt to marriage. The motivation for the action is the ‘human’ part, the ‘universal’, those hundreds of feelings and emotions that prompt action and defy race, culture, distance and time. These universals are a powerful way for a writer to connect with a reader. People are always people and the way they relate to each other is the basis of all literature.

I'm sure Moira would love any Canberrans to hop along to the launch - RSVP as below.

"Ten Thousand Aftershocks" by Michelle Tom - Review

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Wed, 08 Sep 2021 01:41:00 +0000

Many years ago, I went to a museum that had an earthquake simulation exhibit, where you stood on a platform and hit a switch and the platform moved around like it would in an earthquake. It was pretty scary, and I’ve never forgotten it. So the idea of a memoir that takes in both family upheaval and the experience of living through the earthquakes in Christchurch was intriguing. An obvious correlation, you might think.

But Michelle Tom’s memoir goes much deeper than this. I first knew of Michelle’s estrangement from her mother through a Facebook connection, and then I read a portion of the book that was awarded a prize and published. I thought I knew what the book would be about, but it is so much more than just a “telling of a story”.

Firstly, there is the fragmented nature of the memories, as it moves between childhood and adult years over and over – dating each segment is helpful, but also the descriptions and her ability to clearly “situate the reader” means it’s never confusing. It’s also not a misery memoir. Among the sections about violence and abuse are stories of fun times, growing strength and resilience, and finally the ability to stand back and “see” and understand, and then move on. Something that many people never achieve.

Having fully engaged with Michelle’s descriptions of growing up, of the damage and the denied need and then the damaging consequences for her and her siblings, getting to the big earthquake and their experiences of its devastation comes as a shock. How she and her husband and family endured the after effects is a story in itself. I cannot imagine having to continue living in a house beset by aftershocks where liquefaction happened constantly around them (with accompanying sewage from broken pipes) and finally surged inside.

Michelle may not realise herself how much her strength and sheer guts shines through this memoir. It’s probably the element that made me marvel most at the stories she relates. It also led me to think deeply about my own family, our stories and experiences, as well as those of close friends. It’s also a great book to read in this time of Covid and lockdowns, simply to show how we can survive and keep living and hoping, and that a new life is possible.

Achieving close point of view in third person

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Thu, 12 Aug 2021 03:35:00 +0000

The other day I was the guest in a Q&A session sponsored by the Melbourne City of Literature and Writers Victoria. The topic was self editing - to be clearer, how do you learn how to edit your own work? I put my hand up to do this session because I have now been working as an editor for two years, after doing it part-time while teaching writing and editing for many years. So I have seen many manuscripts of all shapes and sizes over that time.

From this session came many questions from the audience, including:

What are the most common issues you see in manuscripts?
How do you approach editing your own novel? Where do you start?
What does a professional editor do for you?
Is it better to focus on having some beta readers?

I will answer these questions more in future posts, but one of the issues I discussed was that of point of view - how much writers struggle with it and how often they aren't aware of what is going wrong.

Mostly what I see is distance. You might assume that writing in first person makes everything immediate and "real", but point of view is more than just using I or he/she. It's about engaging the reader by helping them to feel like they are right inside that character, being part of their experience.

Of course, not every novelist wants to do this. It depends on the novel. But like most readers, I do want to care about what happens to this person, understand where they're coming from, what is pushing them through the story towards "something", even if they aren't entirely sure themselves what that is. All the same, the reader needs to know and to want them to achieve it.

Someone once said to me, "Every character wants to be happy. But every character has a different belief of what will make them happy." Therein lies the story.

There are a number of things you need to have on the page so your character comes alive and the reader can't help but follow them through the story. "Un-put-downable" is what we hope for! One of those things is their thoughts. If we don't know what they are thinking, how can we understand what makes them do what they do? How they feel about it? What their response is? I wonder if some writers shy away from thoughts because they seem too obvious.

If you are using deep point of view well, thoughts will be direct and won't even need "she thought" or "she wondered". So rather than:

I hate the way he laughs and spits all over the table, she thought.

We can go further into her mood and feelings and reactions with a direct thought, using her own voice.

God, he's gross. Who laughs and spits all over the table at the same time? I want to shove a serviette in his horrible mouth.

Direct thoughts can provide an extra layer of voice - a character uses one voice to speak to others, and another (their own revealing voice) in their heads. Direct thoughts also help to disguise the writer's voice which can sometimes be too intrusive and sound nothing like the character, using words their character never would. (And you don't need italics for direct thoughts either - I have done this here for clarity, but I only use italics if I want to emphasise.)

We are told to "show" emotions, not tell them, and again, deep point of view makes this easier. You can get inside the character's physical sensations more easily, again in their own voice. Rather than:

John felt the anger rise up inside him like a red wave.

You can try something like this:

John's skin burned and then the rage erupted, rising out of his guts like hot, fast lava, scorching his throat on its way out.

Your character John might describe that feeling of rage differently - he's your character. If you know him deeply enough, then it becomes easier to imagine how it would feel to him.

Deep point of view also is about knee jerk reactions, or slow burning reactions, impulsive words, impulsive actions. Who is your character when they lose control? Who are they when they plan and carry out devastating deeds? Where does that come from? Why?

Answer those questions and you are on your way to deepening your point of view.

Photo by Ryan Franco on Unsplash

Celebrant sleuthing with Hazel Edwards!

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Thu, 27 May 2021 03:27:00 +0000

Hazel Edwards and I both found we were writing crime fiction for adult readers several years ago, after a very long time writing books for children. I decided to ask Hazel about her Celebrant Sleuth series.

Where did the idea come for a celebrant sleuth?

Like many others, my family is spread across generations and cultures. And friends are re-committing , divorcing or blending. So I’ve seen celebrants in action at weddings , name-days and funerals. And I found specialists in clients: by age, culture and types of ceremonies. Plus most celebrants are very personable. I wanted a versatile occupation for my series sleuth which would enable access to different settings and cultures in each mystery and adapt well from book to screen. But I wanted my sleuth to be a quiet activist, not just a device.

Then, on a literary panel about gender including our ‘f2m the boy within’ YA novel, I met an extremely articulate and thoughtful asexual in her early thirties, who challenged me to write about her gender circumstances. She was NOT a celebrant. She was a park ranger. But the idea of juxtaposing a romantic personality in a longterm relationship within the character of a celebrant who had a job involving romance interested me. ‘I prefer ice cream to sex’ was one of her very quotable comments to me, as she explained the differences between being asexual ( feeling no sexual attraction to any gender) and being a ‘romantic’ desiring and giving affection which is different from being aromantic.

She became one of my ‘expert’ readers. Along with the 25-plus celebrants I interviewed. And the multiple florists who really are psychologists. I toyed with qualifying as a celebrant, but instead interviewed trainer Sally Cant who was an ethical but rich source of anecdotes on lost rings, in-laws and not allowing unlimited speaking at a funeral. Rituals with heightened emotions were perfect for historic grievances, mysteries and crimes and some humour. Things always go wrong. Apt for a series.

Another challenge was limited fictional time. The mystery or crime needed to occur within the event or in the preliminary family meetings.

Motives mattered. Eulogies were mini-life stories. But some ‘facts’ were total works of fiction masking murderous motives of ‘getting back’ at someone. Others were romanticised. Writing them was a means of control which was occasionally allocated to the celebrant as a compromise. Lots of potential for characterisation and interpretation. Wills mattered, but so did previous relationships and unexpected children.

And since I’m an episodic writer who works best in short formats, the discipline of one mystery per chapter was viable. But I found having to plot the concentrated mystery equivalent of a book each time was a challenge. I plotted between 6 and 8 am when my brain was clear. Researching , interviewing and editing, I did other times of the day.

What makes a celebrant perfect as a detective?

Good celebrants have compassion, are articulate and often come from other occupations which required public speaking. Need to be observant and quick on sizing up personalities and handling potential disputes and flare ups. Perfect for sleuthing.

To make Quinn memorable, I played with first person viewpoint. Quinn introduces herself. ‘I buried my father, married my sister and sorted the missing will.’

How do you plot, and deal with all the clues and red herrings?

Each of my chapters in ‘Celebrant Sleuth; I Do or Die’ is a self-contained mystery but there are permanent characters from the regional township, including Bea, Quinn’s caterer sister. Food is important for rituals. The extra mini sequel used the Ghan for a railside wedding in the outback stop of the real Marla township. Our script focussed only on this Agatha Christie role-play of ‘Murder on the Orient Express’ style as it had more filmic potential. And a Ghan shaped wedding cake.

Having a co-writer is the BEST way to craft a complex plot and justify red herrings and distractors. Geoffrey Wright (Australian film director and screenwriter, who gained cult success with the 1992 film Romper Stomper) intensified the plot. We were commissioned for the ABC Fresh Start development fund to co-script the screen adaptation. Now temporarily on hold due to lack of ABC funding.

“Wed Then Dead on the Ghan’ was inspired by my original mini sequel to the first book with the celebrant sleuth, Quinn, But deeper motivation and pacing were vital for characters and my original plot needed to be ‘grittier’ and more sophisticated. Geoffrey included topical mining, indigenous art theft and corporate research and political motivation beyond my original kindergarten version. He stressed the need for complex timing. Who was where, when? And more sub plots. Apart from learning to use Final Draft formatting program for scripts, Geoffrey had me checking whether the train cabin doors opened outwards or inwards as relevant to who saw or audio-recorded what and when.

Technical details mattered. We checked drone usage in outback. Police jurisdictions across outback , whether Sth Australian or NT, and the seasonal Ghan timetable which is known by locals to the minute. Participation observation research is vital and I’d travelled on the Ghan several times. So I knew about opal dealers carrying valuable minerals in plastic Safeway shopping bags. And that mobile phone reception was limited. Staff use radio. Then we had to check railway procedures for passenger death reporting and whether suspicious or not. Would a helicopter come out? Could we bypass Alice Springs tourist excursions , which we needed for the timing of discovering the second death and go straight to Darwin police? Detail. Detail. Detail.

We re-worked the clues between us, and placed and checked the red herrings. Vital to have two minds checking.

Celebrant Sleuth is set in a small country town – what does this setting provide that a city setting doesn’t?

A country town enabled me to concentrate events and allow characters to meet in different roles, without it seeming coincidental. I lived in a country general store as a teenager, so that was research, in hindsight.

My sleuth, Quinn, is in a long-term relationship with Art who runs the community media. So I needed her to be able to ‘bump into’ other regular characters in their neighbourhood, apart from her work performing ceremonies for marriages, funerals and naming days. My time-limited crime had to occur within Quinn’s bookings.

The mysteries are episodic, with celebrant Quinn solving problems in the football hall of fame, retirement village chapel and inter-relationships of florist ,caterer and media in the country township during an economic downturn. Millionaire retirement village owner, eighty-something Flora is feisty and falls for a younger man. I had to create a whole township of intersecting roles and streets.

Belatedly I drew a map. And then the same-sex marriage legislation occurred and one story had to change from a commitment service to a wedding.

Marriages and funerals are settings of heightened emotion but also likely to have outsiders visiting.Then there was the option of a celebrant being invited expenses-paid to a specific tourist location for a wedding. That happens. Hot air balloons. Heritage parks.

And the iconic ‘Ghan’ train with an Agatha Christie mystery theme onboard, plus the wedding was pulling together diverse suspects and motives. This was issued as a stand alone e -book with a view to pitching the sample print copies for screen. It worked.

You have had great reviews, people calling it “witty” and “funny” – it seems well and truly time for crime fiction that makes us laugh – how do you tackle writing comedy? What do you have to keep in mind?

Scripting is different from writing fiction as there is more emphasis on pacing and action. Less introspection. I’ve never considered myself a writer of slapstick or stand up. Often I’ve taken an absurd situation and the humour comes from juxtaposing expectations. I prefer wit and playing with words rather than slapstick or action farce. So having to adapt aspects of ‘Celebrant Sleuth’ to audio and then for screen meant adding more content, stronger character motivation and sub plots, but there was the bonus of visuals like the Ghan and the outback and expressions on faces. Plus music and sound effects. There’s nothing quite like the mystique of train noises.

Quinn has a sense of the absurd, indicated by her wry Quinn’s Laws of Relativity such as:

'Theory of Soul Mates: The number of times the word soul-mate is used in public is in reverse proportion to the number of months the relationship will last.'

So the humour depends upon ironic comment, often by Quinn. The blurb suggests this too.

Quinn, a celebrant with style and a few obsessions but a good heart, solves quirky problems, mysteries and the occasional murder at weddings, funerals and naming ceremonies in her country town.

Ex-actor with a great voice who writes eulogies to die for! Not forgetting a few quotable ‘Quinn’s Laws of Relativity’. A romantic, but asexual, Quinn lives with her long-term partner Art who runs community Channel Zero.

The workstyle of a celebrant is never routine. Fake I.D. Fraud. Fights, even to the death, over wills and inheritance ... Mislaid rings. Lost bride. Food poisoning. Clients of varied ages and cultures are well looked after. Even vintage millionairess Flora with the much younger lover who might be a con-artist.

Quinn solves most problems but not always in the expected way.

And I’ve got the start of my next celebrant sleuth mystery in the series, ‘Questions remain unanswered…. ‘ No title yet but it will be sub titled Celebrant Sleuth series.

https://www.hazeledwards.com/celebrant-sleuth.html for details.

Thanks, Hazel - the background to crime fiction is always as fascinating as the stories!

Photo by Say_Heidi

Long-term Sisters-in-Crime member & cultural risk-taker, Hazel Edwards has diverse genres amongst her 200 published books. She is best known for the ‘There’s a Hippopotamus on Our Roof Eating Cake’ series which toured as a musical. ‘f2m: the boy within’ her co-written YA coming of age novel about trans youth was a first. ‘Hijabi Girl' will be performed by Larrikin Puppeteers post-Covid. In 2013, Hazel was awarded an OAM for Literature. www.hazeledwards.com

Zoom skills - how to do a more professional Zoom interview

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Sun, 25 Apr 2021 02:15:00 +0000

The pandemic has seen so many things move online – classes, work meetings, schooling – suddenly we all know “how to Zoom” and for many, it’s literally been a job saver. Some of the other things that have moved online as well are literary festivals, interviews, panel discussions on current topics – meaning all over the world, we all get to attend these sessions and learn what we want or need at the time.

It's been a wonderful resource – some of the time. But too often, I’ve given up and switched off. Sometimes I don’t even make it halfway through the session. Am I easily bored? No. The problem for me is I have spent more than twelve years doing radio and in-person interviews, mostly with writers, and I get very impatient with interviews that are badly done. Having a computer and a camera doesn’t actually qualify you to be a good interviewer or facilitator. It’s a skill and you have to work at it.

We have the opportunity to hear from experienced writers, entrepreneurs and experts of all genres and industries, from all over the world. But here are the most annoying and amateurish things I see interviewers doing:

· Spending ten minutes of a session introducing people. Not always the interviewer’s fault (the bio stuff should be in the session description and people are capable of Googling) but intros should be minimal.
· Spending the first 10-15 minutes talking about yourself and your own ideas.
· Asking stupid questions. Trying to ask clever questions that fail miserably (cue the interviewee’s puzzled expression).
· Sticking so closely to the standard list of questions that the interviewer fails to pick up on things the interviewee says that are really interesting and should be followed up.
· Bringing the topics of the session back to themselves all the time.
· Letting the interviewee talk on and on and on without reining them in.
· Sessions called “conversations” where the participants clearly haven’t talked before and spend the time either trying to make friends with each other, or prove they’re already friends with in-jokes.

The list goes on – and yes, I am curmudgeonly about this because a great session relies very heavily on the interviewer being good at their job. Why do you think Michael Parkinson’s show lasted so long? Or any TV show where the host is a good interviewer? (I’m not counting the ones where it’s just about getting laughs.)

So I have some guidelines to suggest, ones I have learned from doing more than 600 interviews. The same guidelines apply to any interview you’re doing, by the way, whether you’re talking to someone to research your book, or interviewing for an article, or for your podcast, because an audience will only stay with you if you’ve done your preparation and know what you’re doing.

· Do the research on your subject/interviewee. Do lots of research. About their books, their accomplishments, their track record of expertise, their other publications, their life story, their writing career. Just as importantly, read what other people have written about them! You will very soon see how often the subject is asked the same kind of questions, over and over.

I still remember on my radio show interviewing Terry McMillan, the author of Waiting to Exhale, which was a million-seller. She was bored and impatient. I figured at that point (since the book had been a bestseller for many months) she would have done dozens of interviews. As soon as I started asking her questions she clearly hadn’t been asked much, or at all, she became interested and chatty and we had a great interview.
It's your job as interviewer to get the best out of your subject that you can – not for you, for your audience. You can only do that by knowing who they are, what their work is and what it's about.

· The same goes for an interview for research. Do your own research first, know all the basics that anyone can find online, and use the interview time to ask the more difficult, deeper questions that only your subject can answer. Don’t waste their time expecting them to educate you on the basics. Trust me, they’ll know and they won’t be happy. Their time is precious.

· Really think about what questions you will ask. Having done my research, I always start from the point of “What is it that I would really love to know?” I’m a writer and I love to hear other writers talking about process, ideas and problems they’ve solved. But those topics are too vague and generic. Drill down and use your research to ask more interesting questions. For example, your research might not reveal whether the writer writes first drafts by hand or on the computer (and it’s something I know lots of people are keen to hear about, because they ask me). But instead of just asking that question, make it a quick question which usually gets a quick answer, and then ask something like, “What effect does that have on your writing?”

· Try to ask open-ended questions. Questions that will elicit a Yes/No answer are awkward – they stop the flow of the interview, or the interviewee will feel obliged to try and fill their answer out more, which leads to fluff. An open-ended question gives the subject the opportunity to talk. That’s what they’re there for. For every question on your list, check that it’s open-ended and could also suggest anecdotes or examples. Yes, this is a skill to learn. Indeed, I’d say it’s THE skill. And so many interviewers have no idea how to do it.

· If you are interviewing to gain knowledge, know exactly what it is you want to find out. If you’re researching a crime issue, for example, it can be fascinating to hear “war stories” from police officers, but if what you really want is precise information on police procedure in certain situations, you’re going to go home with very little, and then have to embarrass yourself by asking for another interview.

· If you are interviewing for an article, thus your session is one-on-one without an audience, ask permission to record it. As soon as you say you want to do it for accuracy, your subject should be OK with that. Direct quotes from people are what make articles interesting and unique, but you do need to get them exactly right. Don’t change words to get a better quote.
It's not usual for your subject to have approval over your article, by the way, if that is your intended outcome. It can lead to all sorts of issues later on. But it is your professional responsibility to be exact and honest, and recording the interview makes this straightforward.

· Listen to your interviewee’s answers. I see people so focused on the questions they prepared that they don’t even hear when the person they’re interviewing says something amazing or fascinating that needs more discussion and expansion. They just bowl on to the next question. It’s even more ridiculous when the next question is about something the subject already just said. That’s when you hear, “Well, as I was just saying…”

· Put your ego away. Please. Even when the interview is labelled a “conversation”, usually it’s not. It’s just a friendly label for an interview. The audience is there to listen to Writer X or Celebrity Y or Knowledgeable Person Z. Not you. They don’t want to hear your theories or thoughts, unless you are famous, too, and you keep it short. They’re there to listen to the subject. Truly, they are. Put your ego away. And especially put it away if you are a male interviewing a female. Otherwise your ego sticks out like the proverbial…
My rule of thumb is that your questions and what you say (because in a good interview you might find the subject asking you something!) should be 10% or less of the session time. If you’re asking questions that are longer than your subject’s answers, you aren’t doing it right. In many bad interviews like this, what the interviewer is actually doing is showing off.

· Conversely, understand you may have to rein in the interviewee. It’s a judgement call on your part, and can be tricky. One of the best interviews I’ve done, with the late John Clarke, was mostly about me shutting up and letting him tell wonderful stories. That’s what he was like, and that’s what the audience loved. But sometimes people get on a roll and don’t know how to stop (or don’t really want to) and are being boring or didactic or meandering, and you will have to interrupt nicely and get them back on track. One way is to wait for the next time they take a breath, jump in and say, “That’s really interesting. Now, I want to ask you about…” Remember your audience, and how many of them are likely to be thinking, For goodness sake, move it along!

· Think about how to end the interview before you start. Suddenly saying, “Time’s up. Thanks for talking to us” is a bit rude. You can gently say, “We’re getting close to our time, but let’s have one last question.” And have your “thank you” written out so you can say it clearly and genuinely instead of blathering on for another 2-3 minutes. Thank the audience for listening, too. If you have sponsors to thank at the end (or the beginning), have that clearly and concisely written down so you can read it clearly and concisely.

Finally, go and watch interviews on YouTube or websites. Watch the famous interviewers, like Parkinson and David Frost, the chat show hosts, and the recorded sessions in your area of interest. Watch critically. Rewind. Think about which questions work best, which get the best answers, and how the interviewer responds next. Learn from the best, and then apply. Everyone will benefit, but your audience most of all.

(image - by Standsome Worklifestyle on Unsplash)

This post first published by me on Medium - https://sherrylclark.medium.com/

Thinking About First Lines

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Sun, 10 Jan 2021 23:36:00 +0000

What does a first paragraph, made up of all those stunning sentences, actually achieve? Not just capturing your reader’s interest. Your first paragraph also does these things:

· establishes point of view
· creates the tone of the novel or the voice
· brings the main character on stage (not always, but usually)
· presents either the beginning of the story problem, or something intriguing that leads to it
· establishes setting, era, genre
· hooks the reader with story questions

Phew. Hardly surprising that writers rewrite their first page/first paragraph/first line so many times!

The art of a stunning first line is a challenge to every writer, no matter what you write. David Sedaris starts one of his essays with:

"Well, that little experiment is over," my mother said.

Stuart MacBride starts Blind Eye with:

“Damn mist. It gets in your eyes so you can't see no more than a few strides ahead.”

What's the best first line you've read recently?

You can read more of my articles on various aspect of writing at Medium.com. The list is here or go to @sherrylclark.

Book review - "Monstrous Heart" by Claire McKenna

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Mon, 08 Jun 2020 03:23:00 +0000

The initial appeal of this novel for me was the krakens – having studied mythical creatures a while ago, I was intrigued to see what the author would do with this as the centre of her novel. The world she creates is fantastical indeed, with a bizarre mix of old and new – we have characters with talents called sanguis (my trusty Latin dictionary defines it as blood), elektrification as a new technology and petro mechanics of different kinds. The mix did at times seem a bit too odd but mostly I tried to go along with it.

Arden Beacon is about to become the Lightmistress of the lighthouse in Vigil, which is in Fiction – it was clear from the start that there was going to be a lot of language play in this novel. Some of it worked, some jarred for me. I found the most irritating bit was the use of real names and terms that were mishmashed together. The world building felt disjointed and illogical at times. Arden is an interesting character, a woman with a past, whose talent is too small to be of real use or value, so she has been told. This post is her final chance to get her piece of paper she needs to be established. Standing in her way are many people around her – the lecherous Coastmaster Justinian and the manipulative Harrow, as well as the mysterious Lions. Nobody is as they seem, including Jonah Riven who is hated by all for mistreating and (supposedly) killing his wife.

There are multiple little twists and turns in the plot, many configured around the constructed world the characters live and function in. Everything seems wrecked or broken or rotting, including the Justinian mansion. The kraken features mostly as the skin Arden’s coat is made out of, which has magical properties of its own. It would be a spoiler to describe its appearance towards the end. I decided the main thrust of the story was, in the end, the romance between Arden and Jonah, although romance seems too wussy a word. Obsession?

The novel started to really engage me about halfway through, but I suspect other readers will get into it much more than me. The language is ornate, at times too ornate, but what really kept pulling me out of the story were the multiple errors of grammar and meaning. Surely you remonstrate with someone (first line)? When describing the girth of something round and thick, span is not the right word. And so on. I itched to copyedit the whole novel as there were these kinds of little glitches every couple of pages and held me back from enjoying the novel a lot more. (I read a published copy provided by HC, not a proof copy, so can’t blame the errors on that.)

Talking to Finn Bell about crime writing and publishing

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Wed, 20 May 2020 04:40:00 +0000

After reading The Killing Ground, and then looking up Finn Bell out of curiosity, my curiosity got worse! It seemed a bit incomprehensible to me that after four books, Finn was still self-publishing. Sure, other people like Hugh Howie had started self-publishing but then were offered contracts by traditional publishers. On the other hand, writers who'd started with trads had turned back to self-publishing for various reasons.

I was really pleased when Finn agreed to an email interview, and this is it!

Why novel writing? Why crime? Has it been a longtime aim or something fairly recent?

I couldn’t, with any measure of certainty, really tell you why my mind does any of the things it does when left unattended and writing is no different. It started as a way of coping (mostly with myself and my previous career) and has slowly grown into something bigger.

I probably write crime fiction because crime is what I’ve known and when I sit down in front of a blank page that’s what comes out of its own accord. But I don’t think it’s a distinguishing feature of what I do – any story – in any genre – will have something of wrongness, sickness, or brokenness that changes through the pages, I think that’s why reading has utility, has use for the reader, doesn’t matter which genre you’re in. (That’s the point of stories, though right? If a book doesn’t change anything, or make itself (or you) better for reading it, why bother?)

What do you enjoy most about the writing?

There’s almost nothing about it that I don’t like. What do I enjoy most? Probably the sense of completion, a sense that things could have been better, ended better, and the story is how. Or maybe that there is a way of understanding something you don’t want to be real but is. All my books are based on my past career (so old case files, court reports, prison interviews and so on) and all of them involve actual unsolved crimes (at the time of writing a given book).

That’s where my writing started - from diaries, journals and notes of unsolved crimes that lead to writing plausible (but fictional) endings to real unfinished stories. I guess it’s a way of trying to reach across from how things are to how they ought to be (it’s part make believe but it’s still hope even if only a worn, dirty kind).

You’ve set The Killing Ground in Riverton – is it a problem using a real small town in NZ? Have your neighbours read the books?

All my books are set in the South Island of New Zealand in real locations, like the crimes and events the stories are based on, almost everything is real or as near to true as I can legally make it. It hasn’t been a problem yet.

Did you decide to self-publish right from the beginning? Or did that come after some rejections? What led to you doing it yourself?

I didn’t intend to do anything as a writer of any kind. I started writing to cope, to help me sleep (there was no plan behind it). All of the publishing questions came later, my partner talked me into publishing the first few books as ebooks only, and I looked at the content and decided on self-publishing because I honestly didn’t think what I was doing was mainstream enough for traditional publishers to be interested in, I never even approached any before releasing the first 2 books.

This was back in 2016. Since then I’ve been lucky enough to win some awards, gain some fans and sell a few books and have gone from self-publishing ebooks to self-publishing audiobooks, but still nothing on paper. After about a year we did approach agents in traditional publishing but there was no interest (which hasn’t surprised me). (My note - it surprised me!)

How did you go about getting the books ready to publish? Did you have an editor? What help did you get (if any)?

For the text I employ a professional copy editor (for correcting grammar, spelling and punctuation only) and a professional voice artist for the audio books but everything else is me. Plain and simple.

How did you tackle the marketing? What worked for you? What didn’t work?

That’s a big question and one that so many people can answer much better than I can. There’s nothing original or special about what I’ve done. And at first, I did very little, I wouldn’t look to me as a good example, I think almost all my success has come from a strong response from readers and isn’t down to anything I’ve done.

What did you do about reviews and entering awards?

Nothing much really (again I’m not a good example to point at). I got asked online whether I would like to enter the Ngaio Marsh Award a few months after published my first 2 books (the thought hadn’t occurred to me before then) and then I was lucky enough to win the Best First Novel Category. That led to other competitions either contacting me or being referred to me. The same has been true of reviews, it has mostly grown because of word of mouth from reader to reader and has had very little to do with my own efforts as far as I can tell.

After reading The Killing Ground, I was astounded that you haven’t found a traditional publisher or agent. What's happened with this?

As I mentioned earlier, it hasn’t changed. I’m releasing my fifth book soon and there’s been no interest from traditional publishers or agents. I’m ok if it does happen one day and I’m ok if it doesn’t.

Do you feel it’s worth it? Are you selling enough to feel it’s working? (I think you should put the price up but that’s just me!)

Do I think it’s worth it? Yes. Am I selling enough? No. Should I put the prices up? All my books are (at the time of writing this) the lowest price I can make them on Amazon.com (which is 0.99 US $). I did this to support (in a small way) all the people stuck in the pandemic lockdown around the world. (If you read as much as me, cheap ebooks make a difference and I wanted to help, not profit). I’ll raise the prices (probably back to 2.99 US $) once we’re out of the woods and the world gets back to normal.

What next?

We’ll see. My fifth book is done and heading to my editor. After that, probably book 6.

My note - so far I've only read The Killing Ground (have bought the next one and looking forward to reading it), but I suspect Finn's growing readership, despite his lack of super-duper marketing skills, is because the novels are damn good. That's why I wanted to do this interview and let you know about them.

Book review - "The Killing Ground" by Finn Bell

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Tue, 12 May 2020 04:11:00 +0000

I came across this book on the New Zealand Crime & Mystery Writing Facebook page – it sounded good, it was on special so I thought I’d give it a go. Besides, it was set in NZ, my home country, and I love reading crime fiction set there. What could go wrong?

Well, nothing. In fact it all went not only right, but fantastically well. It was one of the few books I’ve read this year that I really didn’t want to put down. The main character, Finn Bell, is a broken man, literally. He’s in a wheelchair after smashing apart his life and then smashing up his car, and we meet him in the opening chapter jammed upside down over a beach full of deadly rocks. How he got there, and why, is the story that unfolds, moving back and forth between the cliff and the beach in the present, and five months before, when it all started. This dual narrative is handled skilfully and kept me guessing all the way.

The Zoyl brothers are the villains, but they’re clever and cunning and seem to have got away with quite a few crimes over the years, including murder. Why nobody has been able to find enough evidence to convict them is the conundrum. Finn, in his bid to run as far away from the wreck of his life as possible, has ended up in Riverton in the far south of the South Island. He’s bought a cottage with a history, one that involves the murder of two people, and he inevitably becomes obsessed with finding out what happened to them.

There are a number of well-drawn supporting characters in the story, and one of my favourites was his no-nonsense therapist, Betty Crowe. That the author has been a forensic psychologist shows, not just in Betty, but also in his keen insights into the characters and their motivations. I think this is one of the biggest strengths of the book, and you tend not to see it in a lot of crime fiction. I was as engaged in Finn’s internal changes and growth as I was in the cleverly twisting and turning plot. (And yes, the main character has the same name as the author – it’s the result of losing a bet, and Finn Bell is also a pseudonym. Don’t worry, it doesn’t matter!)

I was curious about who published this and the three other titles Bell has written, and was quite astonished to discover in an interview he’d done that, even after winning the NZ Ngaio Marsh First Novel award, plus a bunch of others, he still wasn’t able to get a traditional publisher. I’ve already bought the second book and can highly recommend The Killing Ground. (Original title was Dead Lemons, which isn’t quite as catchy.)

Buy on Smashwords or Amazon or your favourite e-book store.

Write Out #6 - today's theme is animals in different ways and approaches to surprise yourself

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Fri, 17 Apr 2020 05:20:00 +0000

Write Out #5 - place and surprise, plus first line games

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Tue, 07 Apr 2020 02:16:00 +0000

Write Out #4 - a variety today to inspire!

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Fri, 03 Apr 2020 01:29:00 +0000

Write Out #3 - words of a feather

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Mon, 30 Mar 2020 05:42:00 +0000

Write Out #2 - music theme today

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Mon, 30 Mar 2020 05:40:00 +0000

Write Out! #1 up on YouTube

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Wed, 25 Mar 2020 01:32:00 +0000

I've started a new project - it's a short video every now and then, recorded via Zoom. It's live and then I have uploaded it to YouTube.

If you feel like doing some writing, find a quiet space and watch this to get you started!

Book review - "The Last Drop of Blood" by Graham Masterton

noreply@blogger.com (Sherryl) — Sun, 16 Feb 2020 23:28:00 +0000

The first thing you realise when starting to read this novel is that it’s set very firmly in Ireland with many Irish characters! The dialogue immediately places the reader right in the middle of the setting, as do the descriptions of landmarks. The River Lee plays a big part, as one of the crimes Katie Maguire has to investigate is the Lee Pusher, someone who is pushing people into the river and drowning them. I had to go and do a search on Cork out of curiosity and the Lee definitely looks like a river you’d be hard pressed to survive, even as a good swimmer.

DS Maguire is high up in the police force now, directing a number of other officers, but still manages to be in the thick of things, along with having to cop the blame when the media start complaining about all the unsolved crimes. First up is the murder of a court Justice, burned in his car, then various gang members start picking each other off in an Irish version of the Hatfields and the McCoys. The cold-bloodedness of the gang leaders is chilling and perhaps this is where the book title comes from.

Between all of this and attempts to derail her career by a jealous superior officer, Katie Maguire has to grit her teeth and keep going, no matter what.

I have read a previous Maguire novel but it’s not necessary to enjoy this one, as it stands alone. The intricate investigation details for all the various crimes and murders are well-woven and I never felt confused or lost track of what was happening. Even minor characters such as the two women involved with the gang leaders are brought to life as rounded and real, which enriches the novel further. It seems this is the last Maguire novel, which is a pity, plus it seems to end rather abruptly, which made me wonder if I had a full copy, or perhaps another one is coming after all …