Nathan Bransford - Literary Agent

This Week in Publishing

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 15:20:00 +0000

This Week! In Publishing!

This Friday I am actually out of town and thus may have missed some news from the last few days. Please feel free to fill in any links that I may have missed! (and please forgive iPad-generated typos)

First up, while I really love spam sandwiches, I do not love spam Tweets (see what I did there?). My real Twitter account now has a verified tag, so please make sure the verified one is the one you follow and not one of the phony imposter fakeries.

Mashabale recently polled their readership about their reading preferences, and found that a plurality still prefer paper books to e-books. Though dare I say I anticipate these results chnaging quickly in the coming years.

And speaking of which, the price of e-readers continues to tumble as Amazon debuts a WiFi enabled Kindle for $139 and a 3G device for $189.

If you're looking for new ways to find good books, Lifehacker picked their five favorite book recommendation services: Shelfari, LibraryThing, Amazon, GoodReads and GetGlue. (via PWxyz)

Penguin is celebrating their 75th Anniversary, and Shelf Awareness had a great article about the history of the company, which famously helped popularize a crazy new fad in bookselling called the paperback.

And CNet took a look at e-book self-publishing options, so if you're considering that option you might check that out because it's quite a comprehensive and informative article. (via @JaneFriedman)

This Week in the Forums, the likability factor in TV and books, the temptations of the delete button, and how to write a character that's smarter than you?

Comment! of! the! Week! will! be! pushed! to! next! week!

And finally, argh because the iPad makes it virtually impossible to use YouTube to embed videos, but here's a link to one that has been making the rounds this week. Jane Austen Fight Club

Have a great weekend!

Can I Get a Ruling: How Do We Feel About Acknowledgments Sections?

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 15:00:00 +0000

This topic came up in the Forum recently, and I'm curious how The Readers At Large are thinking on the subject.

What do we think about thanking the Academy? Do you like acknowledgment sections? Feel they're self-indulgent? Touching? Do you notice? Not notice?

If you're reading in a feed reader or via e-mail, click through for the fancy dancy poll:

poll by twiigs.com

You Tell Me: Who is the Greatest Villain in Fiction?

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 15:00:00 +0000

Mirror mirror on the wall, who is the greatest villain of them all?

Iago?

Ahab?

Fagin?

Voldemort?

Sauron?

Villains are just plain scarier when they only have one name, aren't they?

Who's your choice?

The One Question Writers Should Never Ask Themselves When Reading

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 18:08:00 +0000

Over the course of writing and maintaining this blog, I've found that there is one sure-fire way a commenter can set my teeth on edge and make me bring out the snide comment gun. (Well, I suppose it would work for someone to write an ode to queries beginning with rhetorical questions, but so far I have been spared that unfortunate spectacle.)

Nope. The thing that makes me craziest is when people dismiss any book, especially bestsellers, using the words "trash," "terrible," or "suck" and its variants without further comment, or worse, when people say something along the lines of "well most published books suck anyway." My teeth are chattering at the thought. CH-CH-CH-CHAATTEERRIINNGGG...

Firstly, these books plainly don't suck if they are attracting readers in large numbers. You just don't happen to like them.

Secondly, call me an old fuddy duddy OMG I sound like my parents, but we have brains and we can use words, and in a perfect world those two abilities would combine to form a thought more insightful than "X sucks."

Thirdly, if this is all an aspiring writer is taking from a book, they missed the main point of reading it. All they figured out is whether they liked the book or not.

And quod erat demonstrandum pro quo tempura I don't actually know Latin, the one question that aspiring writers should never ask themselves when reading a book is, "Do I like this?"

Here's the thing about the question "Do I like this?" Who is that question about? Well, it's about you. It's about your taste, and whether the book fit in with your likes and dislikes. It's not about the book. It's about you and whether the book spoke to you.

In other words, all you're learning about when you ask "Do I like this?" as you read a book is yourself.

Now, don't get me wrong. Knowing what you like is important. But by the time we're an adult we pretty much know our likes and dislikes. Sure, some things can take us by surprise (like my inexplicable and deep-seated love of The Bachelor), but plumbing the depths of our likes and dislikes is about entertainment, it's not knowledge that is overly helpful as a writer. Knowing your likes and dislikes will help you imitate, but it won't help you learn tools you can really use.

The real question aspiring writers should ask is not whether they liked a book, but whether they think the author accomplished what they set out to accomplish. How good is the book at what it is trying to do? Dan Brown did not set out to be Marilynne Robinson, and Marilynne Robinson does not set out to be Dan Brown. So why judge Dan Brown's prose against Marilynne Robinson's or Marilynne Robinson's chase sequences against Dan Brown's?

If the author set out to write a cracking thriller did they write a cracking thriller? If they wanted to create beautiful prose and make us think deeper about ourselves, how well did they do that?

Once you start looking at an author's intent, you'll start to see where they succeeded and didn't succeed at what they were trying to accomplish. And you'll also start seeing that what most megabestsellers have in common is that the authors were phenomenal at delivering the thing(s) they set out to accomplish and at giving readers the experiences they wanted to give them. You'll start absorbing the positive attributes of books you might not even like all that much.

Asking this question and really thinking about it is the place where nuanced reading starts, and where writers will start noticing craft, technique, and things they can actually use when they write.

So if you want to be a writer, please please please don't reduce books to pithy generalities like "suck" and "terrible," and think and speak about books with more nuance. My chattering teeth will thank you.

Page Critique Monday: My Critique

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 20:21:00 +0000

Thanks again to darylsedore for bravely offering the page. I think this is an interesting high concept beginning, and the page is able to build a suspenseful tone, which I enjoyed. The "bring hammer" part of the premonition was a great touch, and I really want to know why she's under that bridge.

My concerns with this page have to do with the opening lines and with the overall polish.

I'm honestly not quite sure whether the opening rhetorical questions are meant to be taglines or whether they're intended to be the first lines of the manuscript. As someone who doesn't care for queries beginning with rhetorical questions, I'm afraid I'm not usually a fan of them kicking off novels either. I would suggest cutting the two lines and letting the mystery build on its own - "Sarah Roberts looked at her watch again" is a perfectly fine opening line.

And in terms of overall polish, I'm afraid I just didn't feel that the writing was smooth, and I was tripped up by some awkward phrasing and confusing descriptions, which are below in the redline. Lack of precision was the main culprit, and there were places where I thought a better word choice could have been more effective.

With more polish I think the reader will be more engaged as the plot unfolds.

REDLINE

Title: The Precog
Genre: Thriller
Word Count: 250

Would someone die today? Would she be able to save whomever it is she’s supposed to save? Confused by this opening
Sarah Roberts looked at her watch again.

10:15am.

Three minutes until the premonition came true.

This was the fifth one she chose to act on. She’d had seven in the last six months. The first two were neglected Passive voice. She didn’t know was happening then a tad awkward, and a word missing - it took me a little while to realize "then" meant when she was first receiving the premonitions. But now, she followed her notebook details "notebook details" the right word choice? exactly as they were written. Sarah didn’t question the cryptic words. Fear played a role, but confidence won didn't quite understand this - fear played a role in what and confidence won what? If she doesn't question the words, what does she fear?.

She reached back and found a few stray hairs above the nape of her neck. ~~She massaged them until they were firmly in the grip of her fingers~~ "massaged" the right word choice? do we need this sentence? . Then she tugged them out. She closed her eyes and leaned back on the dirty cement. The slight pain ~~that oozed over her skin~~ soothed her does pain "ooze"?, calming the nerves.

Vehicles crossing the bridge above came to her didn't quite understand "came to her". She made a mental note that the next time she had to hover under a bridge waiting for whatever was supposed to happen she would bring a pillow to sit on. The hard cement ~~ground~~ ~~she inhabited~~ angled toward a small river at forty-five degrees. ~~It was hard cement~~. The grass on either side looked more comfortable, but the message was specific. If there was anything Sarah knew, it was to follow the messages with absolute precision.

Thinking of the message, she recited it in her head; Sit directly in the middle, under the St. Elizabeth Bridge. At 10:18am. Bring hammer great detail.

Page Critique Monday

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 18:29:00 +0000

Time for Monday's page critique! Refresher on how this works:

- If you're interested in submitting a page for a future critique, enter it in this thread in the Forums (and be sure and check out the directions in the first post).
- I use a random number generator to select the winning critique.
- Please please please remember the sandwich rule when offering your thoughts: positive, very very constructive thoughts, positive. I mean it. Err on the side of being nice.

As of this posting there were 347 posts in the thread, and the number that the good machine at random.org gave me was..........

10!

Congrats to darylsedore, whose page is below.

I'll be back in a bit with my critique.

Title: The Precog
Genre: Thriller
Word Count: 250

Would someone die today? Would she be able to save whomever it is she’s supposed to save?
Sarah Roberts looked at her watch again.

10:15am.

Three minutes until the premonition came true.

This was the fifth one she chose to act on. She’d had seven in the last six months. The first two were neglected. She didn’t know was happening then. But now, she followed her notebook details exactly as they were written. Sarah didn’t question the cryptic words. Fear played a role, but confidence won.

She reached back and found a few stray hairs above the nape of her neck. She massaged them until they were firmly in the grip of her fingers. Then she tugged them out. She closed her eyes and leaned back on the dirty cement. The slight pain that oozed over her skin soothed her, calming the nerves.

Vehicles crossing the bridge above came to her. She made a mental note that the next time she had to hover under a bridge waiting for whatever was supposed to happen she would bring a pillow to sit on. The ground she inhabited angled toward a small river at forty-five degrees. It was hard cement. The grass on either side looked more comfortable, but the message was specific. If there was anything Sarah knew, it was to follow the messages with absolute precision.

Thinking of the message, she recited it in her head; Sit directly in the middle, under the St. Elizabeth Bridge. At 10:18am. Bring hammer.

This Week in Publishing

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 19:02:00 +0000

It was a pretty eventful week in publishing this, um, week so let's get right to it.

The news that everyone is talking about is agent Andrew Wylie's move to deal directly and exclusively with Amazon for e-book rights to many classic works by authors such as Vladimir Nabokov, Hunter S. Thompson, Philip Roth, and more. Basically, the original contracts for these books were signed before e-books were a glimmer in Jeff Bezos' eye, and Wylie is taking the stance that these rights belong to the authors and not the publishers.

This, as they say, is a pretty big deal for publishers. As author Jason Pinter writes in the Huffington Post, backlist sales represent a huge amount of money for publishers, and could drastically affect the publishers' revenue in the future if they don't have e-book rights to their backlist.

The publishers themselves have reacted strongly. Macmillan CEO John Sargent released a strongly worded statement, and Random House announced that they "would be taking appropriate action" and would not do any business with Wylie's agency until the matter is resolved. For his part, Wylie told the Times that Random House's response took him by surprise, and that he needed some time to think about the situation before responding.

For analysis of what this all means and the full ramifications, definitely check out Pinter's HuffPo article, Kassia Krozser's recent post on the matter, and Publishers Weekly's new PWxyz blog has a good roundup of the reactions around the Internet.

And meanwhile, there was other big e-book news as Amazon announced that e-books have been outselling hardcovers on Amazon for several months. It's not quite apples to apples considering the lower price of e-books, but still, another benchmark as e-books continue their rise.

And yet amid all of this e-book hullaballo, @OtherLisa linked to an article about how indie bookstore sales have risen this year. Go indies go!!!!

In life of a writer news, Tahereh has the five stages of querying, Susanna Daniel wrote an article on the quiet hell of taking ten years to write a novel, and oh yeah, now might be a good time to link to San Francisco legend Broke Ass Stuart's guide to the best literary bars in San Francisco.

Oh, and if that doesn't work you can cheer yourself up with the Times' recent interview with author Ken Follet, who got started writing novels because he needed £200 to fix his car. And now he could probably buy General Motors!

Author Hannah Moskowitz tackled a topic that has been popping up around the publishosphere: the notion that boys read middle grade but not YA, either skipping YA to move straight to adult fiction or not reading altogether. Hannah's take on the subject is definitely worth a read.

And in author promotion news, Donna Gephart has a terrific post by the great Cynthia Leitich Smith about coming up with a promotion plan for your book.

Oh, and speaking of which, JACOB WONDERBAR is available for pre-order! Which is a trip and a half! Maybe two trips!

This week in the Forums: video gamers reveal themselves and discuss the video games, one star reviews of the world's great novels, people discuss their favorite fantasy novels, and of course, how do you celebrate when you finish a book?

Comment! Of! The! Week! goes to Scott, who I thought had an interesting and provocative take on the coming e-book era, and whose comment is great in whole. Some snippets:

Literature is following and will continue to follow the trend of the Information Age: we're not going to take the seller's word for it, we're going to look at other consumers' experiences and make an informed decision... Blogs, Amazon reviews, word of Twittermouth, aggregate sites that are not affiliated with the seller (RottenTomatoes, GameSpot, GoodReads)...

As you listen more, you find people and voices you trust-- it might be Nathan's blog, it might be your brother who reads lots of that genre, it might be a guy in Connecticut who lives in a treehouse and writes Amazon reviews on a lot of related products he's tried...

Most of the conversation above has been about finding and protecting good writing, but I challenge the assumption that that's even what anyone is looking for. It's definitely a huge plus, but what people want is value, not quality...

And finally, I missed this last week, but the Old Spice Guy had a pretty hilarious take on libraries, or as he calls them, places that contain "written words, and written words are the non-pictures that convey anything to other minds." But then! Only on the Internet in 2010, the Old Spice Guy was upstaged by a BYU library's parody of... the Old Spice Guy... on libraries. It's all so meta my brain hurts from my brain hurting from the metaness. Um. Anyway, here are both videos:

Have a great weekend!

Top 10 Myths About Our E-book Future

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 18:52:00 +0000

As we look forward to our (mostly) paperless future, I have been noticing a few predictions out there that I do not agree with and wish to quash like bug. I've previously tackled the Top 10 Myths about E-books themselves, but I thought I'd do a broader one about the reading and publishing world as a whole. Behold!

Man, I love that word. Behold! I am wielding an exclamation point! Behold! Behold!

Ahem. Sorry.

Behold!

1. Due to an avalanche of self-published and poorly edited e-books, readers will be submerged in a big pile of suck.

The avalanche is already here. Go to Amazon and you'll find a million books for sale with more uploaded every day, and yet we're all still able to find the books we want to read. You won't have to go wading through a giant slush pile in order to find something to read. Good books will find you, just like they already do.

2. Publishers are going to disappear.

There's more to making a book than uploading it to Amazon. Even in the e-book era publishers offer a range of services that are not easy to duplicate. While they will no longer be the iron-clad necessity that they used to be in the print era, publishers will still be around.

3. Paper books will disappear.

Some people just love the paper, and not to worry. Even in a world where we read primarily e-books, print will still be an option. Where there is a customer, there is a seller.

4. E-books are going to destroy libraries.

As of last October there were over 5,000 libraries who offer e-books. While I haven't yet heard of an e-reader lending program, I have heard of libraries that lend iPods loaded with digital audiobooks, so e-reader programs can't be far behind. (UPDATE: actually they're already here. See comments section for more)

5. All authors will have an equal shot.

The future will definitely be more equal as authors no longer have to scale the print publishing gates in order to find readers and can upload their manuscript to e-bookstores. Everyone will have a chance, but some chances will be more equal than others. The advantage will still go to authors with platforms and those launched by major publishers. Sorry, all you egalitarians out there.

6. The book world will be divided between a few megabestsellers and everyone else selling only two copies. It will be impossible for authors without platforms to get anyone to pay attention to them.

While, as I mentioned in point number 5, the early advantage will go to those with existing platforms, hits will come out of nowhere, including from people without huge platforms and a built-in audience. Just like the Double Rainbow guy. All it takes for a book to go viral is one person recommending a book to two friends and the process repeating several million times.

7. We're all going to drop our e-readers into our bathtubs amid a massive, world-wide power outage and multi-government e-book deletion conspiracy that causes us to permanently lose every book the world has ever published.

Possible. But unlikely.

8. The reading world will be divided between those who can afford an e-reader and those who can't.

While I think this is a legitimate concern, over the long term: 1) I think the price of e-readers and multifunctional tablets are going to decline to the point of affordability for just about everyone, 2) print will still exist, 3) libraries will still exist, 4) e-books themselves will be cheaper than their print counterparts.

9. Bookstores will disappear.

Let's be honest, a lot of them probably will. But the good and enterprising ones who follow the Powell's model and embrace, rather than fear, the online world will have a reason to survive. Bookstores won't survive because we're nostalgic about them, they'll survive if they continue to give us reasons to buy from them.

10. E-books will evolve into all-knowing robots that will implant carnivorous baby e-books inside our brains and devour our heads from within.

Actually that one's true.

You Tell Me: Which Fictional Characters Would You Want As Parents?

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 17:56:00 +0000

Over in the Forums we've been talking about bad/absentee parents in young adult literature, and yet not all of the characters out there in literature would make terrible parents.

Right?

So. Who in literature would you choose to be your parents?

In Praise of Reading Slush

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 20:18:00 +0000

Amid news from Amazon that another domino has fallen in our inevitable (yes... inevitable) conversion to a primarily e-book reading society, there is one relic of the print publishing process that could very well end up falling by the wayside: the slush pile.

Much maligned, much feared, much sneered at, the slush pile is a repository of hopes and dreams for the authors who populate it, and a Herculean and Sisyphean task for those charged with making the pile go away to make way for the deluge still to come. The slush is full of half-baked ideas, the truly out-there, the very occasional undiscovered gems, but mostly good-solid efforts by perfectly respectable writers, who are up against simple math that simply isn't in their favor: maybe one in a thousand, if that, make it from slush pile to publication with a major publisher, and the odds are getting steeper by the day.

And yet with the transition to e-books, the slush pile could very well be one of the print-era relics swept out in the digital tide. When publishing one's book is as simple as uploading a document to an e-bookstore, who needs someone to sort through all those manuscripts to decide which ones should be published?

Writing in Salon, Laura Miller wrote a cautionary article about the literary consequences if everyone can easily become a published author, and she had harsh words about the slush pile, while respecting its importance:

You've either experienced slush or you haven't, and the difference is not trivial. People who have never had the job of reading through the heaps of unsolicited manuscripts sent to anyone even remotely connected with publishing typically have no inkling of two awful facts: 1) just how much slush is out there, and 2) how really, really, really, really terrible the vast majority of it is. Civilians who kvetch about the bad writing of Dan Brown, Stephenie Meyer or any other hugely popular but critically disdained novelist can talk as much trash as they want about the supposedly low standards of traditional publishing. They haven't seen the vast majority of what didn't get published -- and believe me, if you have, it's enough to make your blood run cold, thinking about that stuff being introduced into the general population.

Needless to say I don't share Miller's fear about releasing the slush into the wild for the reading public to sort out, but I definitely agree with her on one count: the world is divided between those who have read slush and those who haven't.

If you haven't been exposed to the constant fire hose of submissions, if you haven't had to spend afternoons rendering instant value judgments on short summaries of magnum opuses, and developed the ability to instantly tell good writing from bad: well, you're missing out.

If you're a writer, in my opinion there's no better education than reading slush.

Reading slush, of all kinds, trains you to spot what works and what doesn't. It forces you to spot clues that will instantly tip you off to whether a manuscript is working or not, and even better/worse, you'll start spotting them in your own writing. And when a terrifically written book comes along and sucks you in you'll appreciate it that much more, knowing just how rare they are.

Maybe most importantly: reading slush reminds you that publishing is a business.

While I don't know anyone who thinks any slush pile-based sorting process is perfect and surely there are gems lost along the way, any book that makes it through represents the collective seal of approval of quite a few people in the publishing chain.

At least...... it does now. Soon, we could very well have a world where the slush pile is sourced out to readers themselves, who will likely turn to tastemakers and trusted publishers and brands to find the books they are interested in reading.

I by no means think the slush pile will go away entirely - anywhere there's a bottleneck and a tastemaker there will be slush - but it could lose its primacy in the author's (and agent's) life. Instead of the agents being the first line of defense, slush will become more diffuse among different and varied people, and will be less of the place where a book's ultimate fate is decided.

And if you're a writer, I say: read it while you can.

Page Critique Monday: My Thoughts

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 19:35:00 +0000

Thanks again to KRWriter for venturing the page and to everyone who has already entered their constructive advice. I like the idea of a character staring at Earth and feeling scared about what has happened there, which immediately opens up questions about what could have transpired.

My main concern with this opening is that I fear that it stumbles at one of the most essential functions of a first page: getting the reader into a flow.

Starting to read a book isn't easy, and particularly with an unfamiliar setting it's so important for writers to ease the reader into the world and lead them from one thing to the next so that they can begin to place themselves within the setting. And one of the best ways to create flow is by looking at each paragraph as a cohesive whole - it should have a beginning, middle and end (just like a chapter, and just like the story in its entirety). One thought flows to the next, the sentences flow together, and the next paragraph either starts a new thought or complicates a previous one.

In nearly every paragraph in this page, paragraphs start one way and then veer off in a different direction, and the result is a choppy reading experience that doesn't give the reader a crucial sense of flow.

For instance, the first paragraph starts with description (earth), then veers into exposition (about how people still live there), then back to description (the hand). It just didn't feel like any of the thoughts were properly completed or quite fit together, and I wonder if this paragraph would be more effective if it were rearranged into two paragraphs with completed thoughts, roughly along these lines:

The Earth hung in the blackness, a bright blue and green orb floating in a black sea of stars and silence. Voya placed her hand against the cool glass, sweaty palm hiding Earth from view, ~~as if~~ trying to block it out. The past few sleepless nights found her tossing in turning in a cold sweat, waking from nightmares she couldn’t forget.

Some people still lived on Earth. They chose to stay during the Great Evacuation of 2800. Voya’s people chose to leave the polluted mess and let Earth heal itself. (more here to ground the reader in what actually happened before you get into dreams)

Similarly, the second paragraph seems to veer from dream to awake then back to dream in the third paragraph, and I think it would be more effective if there were one paragraph about where she was sleeping and one paragraph about the dream:

Her dorm room lay in darkness, the only light coming from the stars winking in the sky outside. In a few short hours the morning bell would ring, signaling the start of classes for the day and the beginning of a new school term. Voya climbed back in bed, pulled the covers up to her chin, and squeezed her eyes shut. She was determined to fall asleep again before morning.

The dream started as it always did. Ark2 crashed to Earth, dragging a plume of flames and smoke behind it. Odd, she thought, to be viewing the crash from outside the ship. Usually she viewed it from a window, clinging to a bare pipe or door frame while the ship shuddered and jolted, everything succumbing to flames outside.

(Then a paragraph about Earth's inhabitants attacking the ship in the dream).

If the paragraphs moved from one thing to the next, the flow would be much improved.

All that said, it's still somewhat risky to begin with a dream sequence unless it's absolutely necessary, because without knowing more about the world it's difficult for the reader to know how literally they should take what is transpiring in the dream, and they may well feel like the writer is sending them on a wild goose chase. But I think there is some good material to work with in this page, and with some more organization I think this is going to be an evocative beginning.

More specific thoughts in the redline below:

Title: Untitled
Genre: YA/sci-fi
250 words

The Earth hung in the blackness, a bright blue and green orb floating in a ~~black~~ sea of stars and silence black repeated. Some people still lived on Earth. They chose to stay during the Great Evacuation of 2800. Voya’s people chose to leave the polluted mess and let Earth heal itself. Voya placed her hand against the cool glass, sweaty palm hiding Earth from view, as if trying to block it out "as if" cuts against the omniscient perspective - is she or isn't she trying to block it out? The voice should know. The past few sleepless nights found her tossing "nights found her tossing" slightly awkward phrasing in turning in a cold sweat, waking from nightmares she couldn’t forget.

In her dreams, Ark2 crashed to Earth. Earth’s inhabitants were rumored to be hostile, and in the dream attacked the fallen ship. Her dorm room lay in darkness, the only light coming from the stars winking in the sky outside Is this happening in the dream? Or are we back to her being awake?. In a few short hours the morning bell would ring, signaling the start of classes for the day and the beginning of a new school term. Voya climbed back in bed, pulled the covers up to her chin, and squeezed her eyes shut. She was determined to fall asleep again before morning.

The dream started as it always did, with Ark2 crashing to Earth, dragging a plume of flames and smoke behind it. Odd, she thought, to be viewing the crash from outside the ship Is she fully conscious in her dream? Remarking on the oddness of her perspective seems like a very fully-formed thought to be having within a dream. Usually she viewed it from a window, clinging to a bare pipe or door frame while the ship shuddered and jolted, everything succumbing to flames outside.

Page Critique Monday

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 17:28:00 +0000

Time for Monday's page critique! Refresher on how this works:

- If you're interested in submitting a page for a future critique, enter it in this thread in the Forums (and be sure and check out the directions in the first post).
- I use a random number generator to select the winning critique.
- Please please please remember the sandwich rule when offering your thoughts: positive, very very constructive thoughts, positive. I mean it. Err on the side of being nice.

As of this posting there were 305 posts in the thread, and the number that the good machine at random.org gave me was..........

62! But that page was disqualified because it was way more than 250 words. The next number was........

200! Congrats to KRWriter, whose page is below.

I'll be back in a bit with my critique.

Title: Untitled
Genre: YA/sci-fi
250 words

The Earth hung in the blackness, a bright blue and green orb floating in a black sea of stars and silence. Some people still lived on Earth. They chose to stay during the Great Evacuation of 2800. Voya’s people chose to leave the polluted mess and let Earth heal itself. Voya placed her hand against the cool glass, sweaty palm hiding Earth from view, as if trying to block it out. The past few sleepless nights found her tossing in turning in a cold sweat, waking from nightmares she couldn’t forget.

In her dreams, Ark2 crashed to Earth. Earth’s inhabitants were rumored to be hostile, and in the dream attacked the fallen ship. Her dorm room lay in darkness, the only light coming from the stars winking in the sky outside. In a few short hours the morning bell would ring, signaling the start of classes for the day and the beginning of a new school term. Voya climbed back in bed, pulled the covers up to her chin, and squeezed her eyes shut. She was determined to fall asleep again before morning.

The dream started as it always did, with Ark2 crashing to Earth, dragging a plume of flames and smoke behind it. Odd, she thought, to be viewing the crash from outside the ship. Usually she viewed it from a window, clinging to a bare pipe or door frame while the ship shuddered and jolted, everything succumbing to flames outside.

This Week in Publishing

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 18:00:00 +0000

This week in double rainbows I mean publishing...

Stephen Parrish pointed me to a NY Times survey of the world of book trailers, those magical creatures that use video to convince us we should read books. While only 0.1% of everyone out there decided to purchase a book via a book trailer, the kids these days seem to love them according to an online survey at Teenreads.

And speaking of viral, the I Write Like app was positively ubiquitous this week, though if anyone can prove that it's more than a random author generator I'd love to see it. I plugged the first chapter of JACOB WONDERBAR in and it said I write like James Joyce. So..... yeah. Thank goodness ULYSSES is the most popular novel of all time among children eight to twelve.

William Faulkner speaks!! Some of Faulkner's lectures to students have been uploaded and can be found here. I actually needed some occasional translation help from my Southern wife due to Faulkner's incredible accent, but was totally hooked by his lecture on What Makes Man Endure especially. Faulkner's vision for the last sound on Earth during the end of times: two people arguing about where they're going to go in their spaceship. Oh, actually three, because one will be writing a book about it.

Author Janet Fitch wrote a really terrific Top 10 Tips for Writers, which I thought was way better than most Top 10 Tips for Writers lists. Some of my favorite parts: Write the sentence, not just the story, Kill the Cliche, and most importantly: Write in scenes. (via Jacket Copy)

Society of Authors chair Tom Holland spoke out against industry standard e-book royalties, calling them "not remotely fair."

And over at the Guide to Literary Agents blog, Chuck Sambuchino put together a great overview of the different sections in a nonfiction book proposal.

This week in the Forums: insanely cute kittens, a study shows that competition may impact creativity, which character is the favorite you've ever written, and, of course, how did you come up with that?

Comment! Of! The! Week! goes to Kerry Gans, who I thought had some good insight on the question of why it's so hard to tell whether our own writing is good. Could it be a visual thing?:

Maybe because my typed Word document looks the same as everyone else's typed Word document. What I mean is that you can see that you can't jump as high as the NBA guys, or that the person you drew looks more like freaky tree, or hear that your guitar riff sounds like your cat scratched it out. But my words typed on a page look pretty much the same as JK Rowlings'.

I also think it might be because writing is so much a "felt" art -- you are so invested in what you write that it "feels" good to you. How could you work so hard and put so much of yourself into it and have it NOT be good?

And I think the industry itself makes it hard, because so much of it is subjective. There are some truly awful books that have made it to print, and some very good ones that probably have not. This subjectivity makes it hard to measure how good your work is. As Jon VanZile said above: "There's no way to keep score."

And finally, after linking to everyone's favorite Double Rainbow video yesterday, I'd be remiss if I didn't plug the Double Rainbow song, which is also incredibly incredible. If only I could figure out WHAT DOES IT MEAN:

Have a great weekend!

Open Thread!!

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 19:40:00 +0000

We're smack dab in the middle of summer and I have loads of reading to catch up on (who says publishing slows down in the summer??), so I thought I would stand aside for the day and let the discussion go where it may.

Open thread!

What's on your mind?

Oh, also, this video is a gift from me to you:

You Tell Me: Why is it So Hard to Tell if Our Writing is Good?

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 17:28:00 +0000

Guys playing pickup basketball on the playground don't usually think they can step in and compete in the NBA.

Someone who doesn't own a guitar doesn't usually think he can become the next Jimi Hendrix.

Someone who can't draw doesn't usually think they're the next Georgia O'Keefe.

Why is it so hard for us to tell if we're good writers or not?

Just about every writer at some point has struggled with the Am I Crazies, not really knowing if they have the chops or the ability to make their writing stand out.

And, on the flipside, it sure seems like the majority of people in the world think they can write a book. And not only write a book, but write it as well as a published author. And not only just as well as a published author, but just as well as bestselling published authors who are among the elite in terms of building an audience and having their work catch on with readers. There are lots of people out there who think it's easy, think they could do it, and all but a handful are wrong.

What is it about writing that makes people put on the blinders and fail to recognize their limitations and makes the talented unable to recognize their own goodness?

Buckle Up!!

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 19:00:00 +0000

Publishing industry sage Mike Shatzkin wrote a post recently that was dash of smelling salts by way of a sledgehammer.

The post's title says it all: "Where Will Bookstores Be Five Years From Now?"

If you take Shatzkin's premise that e-books will comprise 50% of the book market in five years (which is current conventional wisdom in the industry; Shatzkin actually thinks that's conservative), he estimates that brick and mortar stores' share of the marketplace will likely plummet from approximately 72% of the market today to 25% in five years. (The other 25% in the print market will be made up of print sales via online booksellers.)

72% to 25%. Five years. Yowza.

These last few years have been incredibly tumultuous for the industry. The recession and the Great Digital Transition combined forces to wallop the industry, and the effects are everywhere: shrinking lists, closing imprints, shuttering indie stores, a vanishing mid-list, and belt-tightening across the board.

Things changed a lot in a short period of time. And it's still quite possible that these last few years were a relative walk in the park compared to what's to come.

If 75% to 25% transpires it will have huge implications for the way books are planned, marketed, acquired, published, and discovered. Everything from the seasonal publishing calendar to print runs to marketing campaigns will be in for reevaluation.

And yet...

As I've said before, people are still buying and reading books. The ease of access afforded by e-books might even mean they'll buy more when they can download a book at home rather than planning a trip to the bookstore. To be sure, there is lots still to be worked out on the author side, including paltry royalties and more reliance on authors for platforms and buzz-making.

But the challenges the industry is facing are on the distribution side of things -- it's literally a massive shift in how text gets from author to reader (and how reader discovers author). Anyone who is part of the paper side of things is going to feel the squeeze.

Still, even as seemingly everything changes, there's a lot that will remain the same. Authors will still write books, publishers will still be the go-to place to put a book together and market it, there will be self-publishing for those who want to go it alone, and readers will have still more choice and ease of access. E-readers are steadily getting more affordable ($99 Sony Readers sold out in the blink of an eye) and contrary to the doomsayers, e-books are not an existential threat to the world of literature. Words are words are words are words no matter how you read them (you're reading pixels now, ain't ya?)

It's certainly a wild ride, but it's a roller coaster, not a death spiral.

Page Critique Monday: My Critique

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 19:18:00 +0000

Over the course of these various page critiques I have been occasionally accused of over-tinkering and impossible-to-please, and so it pleases me to have an entrant where I don't have too many suggestions!

I think this page is in strong shape, and I like this especially: it takes its time and lets the setting unfold. It doesn't try to be overly shocking or clever or try to pull the rug out from under us. It's just a well-written, confident opening.

And that is perfectly fine.

Now, I wouldn't be myself if I didn't have SOME suggestions, which are below. Overall I thought there might be a bit more room for giving more of a hint of Cass' personality and mindset (I'm not quite sure why she's so jumpy), and there were some sentences I'd rejigger to improve the flow. I also think there's room to give the man a bit more personality by giving a sense of why he gruffly sneaks up on her with "This is Private Property" but then doesn't seem to care that she's there.

But overall I think this page is in a good place. Well done.

TITLE: Something in the End
GENRE: Women's Fiction
248 words

Cass walked closer to the rocky Newfoundland shoreline to take more photos. Everything around her was worth shooting. Even the rusted boats had a certain rough charm; every mark on their hulls told stories in some language Cass couldn’t understand I like this a lot and think it gives nice insight into her personality, but I find the semi-colon a little awkward and wonder if it would work better broken up into two sentences.

She walked out onto a deserted pier ~~and continued snapping photos~~ No need to mention taking photos twice in the same paragraph. Gulls circled overhead as fishermen started unloading lobster and crab from crates stored on their decks or below. Cass was thankful for her telephoto lens, allowing her to take photos from a safe distance. She wasn’t sure if the locals would see her presence there as an imposition. Maybe more of a hint of personality or explanation here? Without more context it's tough to know why she's so nervous. Is she just nervous being a tourist?

“This is private property.”

The gruff voice behind her caused Cass to jump "caused Cass to jump" feels a little awkward. Maybe just "made Cass jump?" or "Cass jumped when she heard the gruff voice behind her?". She turned and saw a man strolling down the pier toward her. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know,” she called back, struggling to keep her voice even. As he neared she could see he wasn’t very old, maybe ten years older than she was, with dark hair and ~~a few days worth of beard~~ some other description here (I suggest moving the beard description below).

“No harm. Just letting you know.”

“I’ll go,” she said as he came closer. He was tall, broad-shouldered, with a square jaw, visible ~~despite his short beard~~ through a few days worth of beard (no need to mention the beard twice).

“Stay and keep shooting if you’d like. Makes no difference to me. If he doesn't care why did he gruffly say it's private property? Should there be a hint of softening when he sees he made her nervous? It could give more of a sense of his personality, even if he's a minor character” He walked past her and climbed down a short ladder to a boat below. Cass watched, ~~intrigued~~ already apparent. She had the urge to take his picture but wasn’t sure if he’d mind. Something ~~she couldn’t quite put her finger on~~ stopped her from asking.

Page Critique Monday

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 17:54:00 +0000

Congrats to Spain and Octopus Paul for their respective victories in the World Cup! Spain's passing was impressive, but let's face it, Octopus Paul is a living legend.

Time for Monday's page critique! Refresher on how this works:

- If you're interested in submitting a page for a future critique, enter it in this thread in the Forums.
- I use a random number generator to select the winning critique.
- Please please please remember the sandwich rule when offering your thoughts: positive, very very constructive thoughts, positive. I mean it. Err on the side of being nice.

As of this posting there were 252 posts in the thread, and the number that the good machine at random.org gave me was..........

7! Congrats to Cameron Chapman, whose page is below.

I'll be back in a bit with my critique.

TITLE: Something in the End
GENRE: Women's Fiction
248 words

Cass walked closer to the rocky Newfoundland shoreline to take more photos. Everything around her was worth shooting. Even the rusted boats had a certain rough charm; every mark on their hulls told stories in some language Cass couldn’t understand.

She walked out onto a deserted pier and continued snapping photos. Gulls circled overhead as fishermen started unloading lobster and crab from crates stored on their decks or below. Cass was thankful for her telephoto lens, allowing her to take photos from a safe distance. She wasn’t sure if the locals would see her presence there as an imposition.

“This is private property.”

The gruff voice behind her caused Cass to jump. She turned and saw a man strolling down the pier toward her. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know,” she called back, struggling to keep her voice even. As he neared she could see he wasn’t very old, maybe ten years older than she was, with dark hair and a few days worth of beard.

“No harm. Just letting you know.”

“I’ll go,” she said as he came closer. He was tall, broad-shouldered, with a square jaw, visible despite his short beard.

“Stay and keep shooting if you’d like. Makes no difference to me.” He walked past her and climbed down a short ladder to a boat below. Cass watched, intrigued. She had the urge to take his picture but wasn’t sure if he’d mind. Something she couldn’t quite put her finger on stopped her from asking.

This Week in Publishing

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 18:57:00 +0000

This! Publishing! In the Week!

As we look toward our coming e-future, where we will soon be growing food on the Internet and driving flying books, there have been a series of articles putting the brakes on your technoptimism. First, writing in Slate, Jan Swafford posits that e-books and print books will have to co-exist because.... well, I think because tpyos are easier to sopt on paper? Hard to tell, really. I was reading the article on a screen so...

Next up, John Askins passed along a study that suggests that people read books faster than they read e-books (though a second article notes that overall productivity may increase with e-readers).

And finally, David Brooks took note of a study that showed that giving twelve books to disadvantaged kids at the end of a school year improved their test scores vs. their peers, no doubt because forcing the kids to lug twelve books home in the summer heat scared them away from manual labor and motivated them to do well in school. I may have made that last part up. Brooks is actually making a point about print literary culture vs. the short attention span online world, but again, reading on these screens! I'm not getting anything!! Are you getting this? Should we talk about Jake and Vienna instead?

Big congrats to Eric at Pimp My Novel, who is celebrating his first blogoversary (or is it birthablogday?) with some awesome year in review posts. The first is all about co-op, and second on covers. Next year's birthablogday will recap how he conquered the Internet in only two years.

Author Kiersten White has a great post on the reason why YA paranormal books are still undead and going strong: they're a great metaphor for teen romance.

Agent Mary Kole has a terrific post about the perennial argument about whether books are/should be commerce or art. In reality: they're both.

Via the indispensable Jacket Copy, the Guardian recently published a list of the top 10 English pubs in literature.

And you may have deduced this from my book title, but I have a soft spot for old sci-fi. So naturally I loved io9's awesome roundup of old pulp sci-fi covers.

This week in the Forums: a truly brilliant discussion about absentee parents in young adult literature, does social networking really work, bourbon vs. whisky, and, of course, World Cup Fever! One guess about which color I mean team I'm rooting for in the final.

Comment! Of! The! Week! goes to J.T. Shea, who had a hilarious response to yesterday's post about undercooking novels:

And the beet goes on...Sorry, I couldn't resist it.

Seriously, art is indeed life with the boring bits left out. Even the seemingly raw reality of slice-of-life stories and reality TV hides a lot of artifice.

Elevate the food? Eat standing up!

And finally, speaking of reality TV, MTV recently featured my old high school in an episode of If You Really Knew Me. This, ladies and gentlemen, is where I came from:

If You Really Knew Me - MTV Shows

Undercooking a Novel

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 19:20:00 +0000

There was a moment on last week's Top Chef that really resonated with me.

Cheftestant Kevin was in the bottom four for a dish that was influenced by his Puerto Rican in-laws. As the Top Chef hosts ripped his dish to the proverbial underseasoned threads, he protested that the dish reflects how his in-laws cook.

Judge Gail Simmons jabbed back, "Are they professional chefs?"

He sheepishly said no, and she reminded him that he is a professional chef and can't just imitate how people cook, he needs to elevate the food.

This exchange reminded me of so many conversations I've had over the years with aspiring writers. Occasionally I'll point out dialogue or events that aren't working, and someone will protest, "But this is how people actually talk," or "This actually happened."

Writing isn't about capturing real life as it actually happens. We have, well, real life for that.

Instead, writers have to elevate life and add spices and all the rest. Writers interpret real life, elevate it, reorder events, and serve up something perfectly balanced and ready for public consumption.

Serving up raw life on the page without cooking it is like putting a beet on a plate and saying dinner is served. It might be a good beet, but that ain't a meal.

You Tell Me: To Know or Not to Know?

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 18:41:00 +0000

First off, I must share some terrific news - ROCK PAPER TIGER by Lisa Brackmann (who you may of course know as commenter Other Lisa) was just named one of the Top 10 Novels of 2010 by Amazon!! And, if that's not enough, keep an eye out for a terrific review in Sunday's edition of the New York Times Book Review. Congrats, Lisa!

Transition.

Once you, the author, is fortunate enough to have your book out on submission to editors, there is somewhat of a decision to make. Would you prefer to see the rejections as they come in? Would you simply want to be notified of their existence? Would you prefer to think said letters do not exist and only be notified when there is good news?

As an agent I usually err on the side of sharing, because quite often the editors' thoughts may spark ideas for revisions and quite often are extremely complimentary of the author even when it's not a perfect fit.

On the other hand, as previously chronicled, even though I know how this process works, when my novel was on submission the process turned me into a quivering mass of Scaredauthor in a week and a half. But I still wanted to read the letters. Basically, if I'm ever taken hostage, all anyone has to do is wave rejection letters under my nose and refuse to show them to me and I'll crack faster than you can say, "It just wasn't for us and we're sure someone else will snatch this up before you know it."

Whether you've been on submission with editors or not, which way would you prefer?

To know or not to know? That is today's question.

Page Critique Tuesday: My Critique

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 22:13:00 +0000

Thanks again to Erica for being one of the brave souls to offer up their work for public critique!

There is an immediately apparent personality on display here, and I think we get a good sense of the conflict. There is an engaging hook (kid having to move away, doesn't want to), and let's face it, the prospect of moving to a town named after an Italian scooter couldn't be appealing to any teenager.

I broke my thoughts down into two main sections:

Balancing showing and telling

I'm afraid I didn't feel that the balance between showing and telling is quite working itself out in this page. On the one hand the author demonstrates mood through gesture, which is an example of showing, but I wasn't quite sure that enough was gained from the gestures. On the other hand, there are other moments that are a bit too tell-y.

Let's start with the showing. My reservation with the gestures is that they are a bit too what-you'd-expect-from-a-teenager-who-doesn't-want-to-move. Glares, footstomps, anger at parent... pretty much exactly what you'd anticipate. While I think we do get a basic sense of the narrator's personality, I'm concerned she doesn't quite feel unique enough, and that there could be more gained from some unique reactions and perspectives.

And also cutting against the narration, there are moments when we're told precisely what the protagonist is thinking ("The reference to home bothered me more than I wanted my mom to know.", "The two months after my mom announced we were moving made me feel like I was losing my mind"), and I wanted to see those effects in action and for those feelings to be shown.

I've tackled showing vs. telling before, and my basic rule of thumb is that you shouldn't "tell" universal emotions - instead it's better to show how a character is reacting to those emotions. Better still if that character is reacting to those emotions in a unique fashion. We all experience the same basic emotions - how we react to those emotions is what makes us unique.

Stilted Dialogue

Dialogue does not have to sound precisely like real life, but it has to give enough of an impression of real life dialogue that we believe it. I'm afraid I just didn't believe all of the dialogue here. The mom's first line especially ("Child-like antics really don't suit you, Kenz") feels stilted. Would someone say "Child-like antics?" or would they say something like, "You're acting like a child?" Then again, I love the line, "You have two nights left to mope around.", which reveals more than anything else in that paragraph.

The stilted dialogue is symptomatic of a bit of overwriting in general - the paragraphs feel like they could use some streamlining, which I'll try and pinpoint in the redline.

Still, I feel like there is some promising writing here. Like many of you I really liked the last line, and I'd be curious to see where this goes.

REDLINE

Title: A New Day
Genre: YA comtemporary romance

I slammed the car door and shouldered my way past the men scattered around the front yard Can you shoulder your way through people who are scattered? Don't you normally shoulder your way through a crowd?. I spotted my mother and just about growled at her Do people consciously just about growl? while waving my hands at the moving van. "This is ridiculous. Get my stuff out of there!" I tried not to stomp my foot, but apparently my desperation caused my body parts to take control over my brain this feels overwritten, and a bit too self-aware. She tries not to stomp her foot, does, and then reasons that her desperation is causing her body parts to take control of her brain? Couldn't she just stomp? .

"Child-like antics really don't suit you, Kenz, not sure I believe this" my mother replied with a voice that left no doubt that she was sick of me we know how it sounds from the dialogue. "You have two nights left to mope around I like this, and it conveys everything in the last dialogue/tag far more effectively. They're only here for the big furniture this time."

"Fine, I'll sit on lawn chairs and sleep on the floor then feels stilted. You need to give up this moving idea and stay here with me, because I'm not going anywhere."

"This life isn't for us anymore. We're going home." One finger went up as she saw my mouth open for another protest. "Spend tonight with your friends. Tomorrow's going to be busy and we leave first thing Sunday morning."

I ~~did my best to throw~~ threw the moving van workers an intimidating glare as I walked past again, but it just made them grin wider. The reference to home bothered me more than I wanted my mom to know show this.

The two months after my mom announced we were moving made me feel like I was losing my mind the two months make her feel like she was losing her mind? Or the announcement? Precision! . Vespa, Wisconsin was the last place on earth I wanted to live. It was her home, not mine really like this.

Page Critique Tuesday

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 17:57:00 +0000

I'm back in cold and foggy San Francisco, and not a moment too soon, as I understand New York has descended into "Ok this weather is really not funny anymore" territory. 100 degrees and 80%+ humidity? Yikes.

A quick reminder of how these page critiques work:

- If you're interested in submitting a page for a future critique, enter it in this thread in the Forums.
- I use a random number generator to select the winning critique.
- Please please please remember the sandwich rule when offering your thoughts: positive, very very constructive thoughts, positive. I mean it. Err on the side of being nice.

As of this posting there were 219 posts in the thread, and the number that the good machine at random.org gave me was..........

132! Congrats to Erica, whose page is below.

I'll be back in a bit with my critique.

Title: A New Day
Genre: YA comtemporary romance

I slammed the car door and shouldered my way past the men scattered around the front yard. I spotted my mother and just about growled at her while waving my hands at the moving van. "This is ridiculous. Get my stuff out of there!" I tried not to stomp my foot, but apparently my desperation caused my body parts to take control over my brain.

"Child-like antics really don't suit you, Kenz," my mother replied with a voice that left no doubt that she was sick of me. "You have two nights left to mope around. They're only here for the big furniture this time."

"Fine, I'll sit on lawn chairs and sleep on the floor then. You need to give up this moving idea and stay here with me, because I'm not going anywhere."

"This life isn't for us anymore. We're going home." One finger went up as she saw my mouth open for another protest. "Spend tonight with your friends. Tomorrow's going to be busy and we leave first thing Sunday morning."

I did my best to throw the moving van workers an intimidating glare as I walked past again, but it just made them grin wider. The reference to home bothered me more than I wanted my mom to know.

The two months after my mom announced we were moving made me feel like I was losing my mind. Vespa, Wisconsin was the last place on earth I wanted to live. It was her home, not mine.

This Week in Publishing

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 20:56:00 +0000

What a week! My visits are always a whirlwind of meetings, lunches, meetings, meetings, drinks, meetings, and meetings, but it's always fun to be here, get a sense of the pulse and make new connections. And thankfully the weather decided to take mercy on me - I was worried there for a moment.

Now then! I did keep track of some of the news and links this week, and I aim to share a few of them with you. Oh - did I mention I'm writing this from my iPad? First iPad-generated post on the blogt! History being made. Only not really. (Please be extra forgiving of typos!)

The cool kids over at Shrinking Violet Promotions have a terrific post on how best to develop a personal brand as an author. The key? Letting it evolve naturally. Much much more in the post, and definitely worth reading.

In this day and age when everyone is wondering what the next vampire/angels/post-apocalyptic/zombies is going to be, agent Rachelle Gardner has a good reminder about what's happening when publishers buy books in hot genres:, it's often about what's selling.

Agent Jim McCarthy from Dystel & Goderich attended a writers conference where they asked him to be positive in a speech, and it got him thinking - are we in publishing actually too nice?

Comment! Of! The! Week! goes to Laurel. Lots of people mentioned overuse of the word "just" as one of their writing tics, but I loved Laurel's way of showing it:

I just can't stop using the word just. It's just so invisible that it just keeps creeping into my MSs no matter how many times I just search and destroy it.

And finally, an enterprising mixologist has created a new cocktail and called it the Literary Agent: part whisky sour, part Hemingway daiquiri. On that note...

Have a great 4th of July weekend!!

You Tell Me: What is Your Writing Tic?

noreply@blogger.com (Nathan Bransford) — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 13:22:00 +0000

It's been a great and wildly busy week in New York thus far! Thankfully the heat has taken some mercy on my San Francisco-acclimated self, and it's cooled off dramatically. And not a moment too soon: I was in serious danger of melting.

Now then. We all have bad writing habits and little tics that creep into our writing. Whether it's overuse of certain gestures (eye-rolling, sighing, etc.), phrases (I mean, like, now then, etc.), or lines of dialogue ("No way," "Yes way," etc.)

I must confess that my writerly tic is characters looking at things (Jacob saw, Jacob looked at, etc.). It ends up being a little redundant and I have to watch myself.

What's yours?