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More Twitter Pitch Critiques!!! :)

2/5/2015

If you follow me on twitter or follow this blog, you may have noticed that I really enjoy critiquing! :) You can check out some of my previous rounds of pitch critiques here and here if you're looking for inspiration/thoughts. There were some really great pitches!

If you're gearing up for #adpit and/or #pitmad and/or another twitter pitch contest I'm not cool enough to know about, feel free to share your pitch in the comments below and I'll reply with my thoughts. If you're so inclined, feel free to also offer feedback on other pitches. The more the merrier!

And, as a friendly reminder, I also offer free query and first page critiques to my subscribers.

Let the critiquing begin!!! =D

121 Comments

Craft Books on Writing

1/15/2015

1 Comment

This originally appeared on Trouble the Write Way.

I think it’s so easy to get caught up in thinking that this next craft book will open the door for you and make writing a cinch! I’ve had periods in my life where I read more craft books than any other kind of book, which, by the way, I don’t recommend at all. To be a writer, you need to read widely!

So, I enter into this blog post warily and with a big disclaimer: DON’T GET TRAPPED IN THE CRAFT BOOK CYCLE. There are many ways to become a better writer—I’d rate reading (non-craft books), writing (oh, yeah, the actual craft), critiquing (both receiving and giving), and observing (you know, the stuff that you will be writing about) as more important activities than reading craft books.
But that isn’t to say there aren’t some great craft books out there. Here are a few that I find especially helpful and that I recommend again and again.

The Basics
You need to know the rules before you break them. So, what are the rules?

On Writing Well, William Zinsser
The Elements of Style, Strunk and White

Getting at the Heart of Writing
Why do we write? And how can we get past the fear and other mind traps that keep us from writing?

Writing Down the Bones, by Natalie Goldberg
The 90-Day Novel, Alan Watt (Note: you don’t even have to follow the day-by-day guide [I didn’t! :-P], but the soul-nurturing advice helped me get through a lot of mental obstacles. I don’t think I would have written my first novel if I’d never read this)

Working Out Plots

What is a “story” anyway? And why do readers burn the midnight oil (or Kindle back light) on some books and toss aside others?

Story Engineering, Larry Brooks
Wired for Story, Lisa Cron

See what some other pretty cool writers have to say on craft books.

1 Comment

Cover Reveal: MOMENTS by Lisa Terry!

12/29/2014

9 Comments

I'm so excited to share the cover of MOMENTS by my critique partner and fellow Trouble blogger, Lisa Terry. This book has mystery, romance, suspense, and a really adorable Scottish rocker. I think you're going to love Julian's narration and get caught up in the fantastic twists and turns in the story. Plus, part of it takes place in Alexandria, Virginia, which is really awesome city! (I just happen to live there...not biased at all.... :) )

And here's the awesome cover!

They’re dying to be fans.

Scottish rocker Julian McLane lives life as normally as possible. But fame can be lonely, which might be why he’d spent a year looking for the girl he caught making a wish behind the concert arena. His fans aren’t happy to share him now that he has found Emilie—too bad their violent displeasure only pushes the couple together.

Emilie needs protection from rabid fans, so Julian convinces her to tour with him and his prank-loving bandmates so his security team can watch over her too. Julian thinks their coupledom is as right as a love song. But something’s very wrong about murder victims wearing the band’s concert bracelets. Someone seems intent on downsizing the fandom.

Julian holds a twisted mess of clues about the killer’s identity, with every day bringing a different theory, and he’s beginning to think finding the killer means losing Emilie forever.

Preorder on Amazon

Lisa Terry

Lisa Terry lives in the south, riding the state lines of Florida and Alabama. She has enough animals to call it a small farm, so she’s either insane or caring. Or insanely caring. She’s a print news reporter, an editor, and an aspiring Hogwarts student. On any given day, you can find Lisa playing video games, sitting on the beach, or organizing pet pageants. She gave up on fitting in a long time ago and now is fine with being called a walking contradiction. Lisa writes Young Adult and New Adult: contemporary, thriller, mystery, horror and paranormal.

Connect with Lisa

Twitter
@lisaslanding

Blog
lisaslanding.blogspot.com

Facebook
www.facebook.com/lisaterryauthor

Youtube
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCu3RAu_9YczcbP6CjlURACQ

9 Comments

#SFFpit Critiques! :)

11/24/2014

143 Comments

Dan Koboldt is once again hosting #SFFpit, a fun pitch party for just speculative books! I had a lot of fun offering critiques last time around and so...I'm doing it again!

If you want some feedback on your twitter pitch, leave it in the comments below. I'll give you my two cents and, of course, other readers are welcome to jump in.

(And if your book isn't speculative, but you want feedback for #Pitchmas or another twitter pitch party, feel free to post it below too.)

Let the critiquing begin! :)

UPDATE: If you have a pitch that got requests, please post it below so we can revel in your success (and learn from it! :) )

143 Comments

Heartsick has a Cover!

11/5/2014

2 Comments

It was so exciting revealing Heartsick’s cover today! I love so many things about the cover, from the spooky smoke strands to the dress Quinn is wearing. Several blogs helped me spread the word and I’m grateful to all of them and to my publicist, Inkslinger, for setting it all up!

I also got to pop over to a few friends’ blogs. I talked about
New Adult speculative fiction on Ava Jae’s blog
Moving from an agented author to a published author on Dan Koboldt’s blog
The writing process and other aspects of HEARTSICK on Laura Rueckert’s blog

Be sure to check those out when you can.
And…here is the cover! :)

Description
Quinn is looking forward to her senior year. She has big plans to hang out with her best friend Mandy, flirt with cute boy-genius Rashid, party at her favorite dive bar, and figure out what she’s going to do after graduation with her not-so-useful art major degree. But that is before she meets Luke, a hot townie who moves back home to help take care of his dying sister. And it is before the weird epidemic that starts sweeping campus in which people’s eyes mysteriously turn purple. Is it an odd side effect from a new party drug? Is it a rogue bacteria that was developed in a campus lab? Whatever it is, tensions are heating up as the town starts blaming the university, and the student religious group is convinced that it’s the mark of the devil. Quinn and Luke are caught in the middle, especially when Quinn learns that Luke isn’t just a happy-go-lucky, redneck boy-next-door—he is a detective—a fact that triggers Quinn’s phobia of guns and memories of her deceased uncle. In spite of herself and her desire to remain unattached and independent, Quinn finds herself falling for him. But when town and gown relations heat up even further, and Quinn’s friend Danny mysteriously falls to his death, Quinn vows to discover the truth behind the epidemic. As she searches for the people responsible, she realizes that sometimes to gain your independence, you have to be willing to give a little bit of it up.

Excerpt

“Did you go to college?”

His jaw is tight. “Yes.”

“Do you think I could guess your major?” I ask.

“Probably not,” he says.

I don’t like that I don’t even get a hint at what he did before or what he studied. I shrug, start on my second hotdog and then lean back, really aiming for a glint in my eye, if that’s possible to control. I’ll make this a game. “Well, do you think you can guess mine?”

He smiles. “Do I get something if I guess right?”

I hop up onto a stool and let the tip of my toe brush against his knee. When I make contact, he starts, before leaning in. “What do you want?”

“I want a lot of things…” He stares at me. “But for now, I’d settle for a second date.”

“Okay, if you can guess my major, on the first try—” I emphasize that bit with a pointed finger, “—then I’ll reluctantly agree to go out with you again.”

“I don’t like the reluctant part, but I’ll take what I can get. Now, let’s see…” He rubs his chin as though he’s an old-timey detective. He’s ready to pace back and forth across the room with a pipe and a deerstalker hat. “You like photography.”

Shit, he does know that. I start to hum the Jeopardy! theme song. Maybe if time is running out he’ll be more likely to guess quickly and get it wrong? Do I want him to get it wrong?

“Okay, I got it.” He rubs his hands together. “You’re an art major.” His cheeks swell with the weight of his smile.

“You got that just because I take pictures?” I rub my forehead.

“I know more than that.”

“Someone told you,” I say. “If this bet was rigged, it doesn’t count.”

He jerks back and shakes his head, frowning. “No, I wouldn’t do that,” he says. “I noticed you had some pottery on your coffee table, with initials on it, a Q. B.?”

I nod. He’s talking about the bowl I made last year. Initials usually go on the bottom, but I painted them big and proud in the middle. And the bowl is empty. Mandy and I haven’t decided what to put in it. We narrowed it down to fake fruit (lame), M&M’S (which we would devour) or Micro Machines. Clearly, we’re leaning toward Micro Machines.

Luke takes my hand. I think he’s trying to convey his earnestness, his respectability and seriousness of not tricking me into a bet. The pads of my fingers brush against his rough palms and I suppress a sigh. His thumb runs along my pointer finger, sliding to the fingernail. “You also have paint under your nails.” His victorious, smug smile is in full bloom.

I pull my hand away, embarrassed. “Yeah, it’s hard to get all the paint off.”

“I’m sure,” he says.

If you want to read the book, here are some helpful links:

2 Comments

Six Things I Learned at the James River Writers Conference

10/22/2014

2 Comments

A mural covering some of the programs from the James River Writing Conference 2014.

I went to the James River Writers Conference in Richmond, VA, last weekend and it was incredibly informative and fun. My mind is jam packed with writing knowledge and inspiration! Here are a few select takeaways

#1-You Need a Cheese Cube

Jane Friedman put it well, you need a cheese cube. You need a free sample that customers can munch on while they consider buying the block of cheese. What is your cheese cube?

#2-Sex Scenes Should be Authentic

Of course, all writing should be authentic, but sometimes romance writers, myself included, get a little lost in the steam. In a really helpful session, paneled by Kwame Alexander, Iris Bolling, and Kelly O’Connor McNees, they discussed the importance of letting your character, not reader expectations, dictate the sexual actions.

#3-We Should All Be More like Hugh Howey

Based on reading some of his fiction, I thought Hugh Howey would be pensive and reserved. Nothing wrong with that, just…that was my impression. I was very wrong. He’s more like an excited puppy who dashes around a party infusing extra life into a room while greeting ever guest. I mean this in the absolute best possible way. When he talked to me, he made me feel like he really cared about what I thought and really wanted to give me, specifically, advice. I could feel all special about this, but, honestly, he was like that with everyone. I think a lot of success in life has to do with connections and it’s not surprising that Hugh Howey has made a good career for himself via both his ability to write and his ability to make connections. Every author can learn from this.

#4-Throw Away Your First Draft

Tanya McKinnon talked about how you need to write that first draft…and then throw it away. The first draft is just you getting to know the story. That’s it. If you allow yourself to realize that you’re not going to use that first draft aside from as a way into the story, it will free you up to be more creative.

#5-Barbara Kingsolver is Adorbs

I, shamefully, have never read any of her books (though The Poisonwood Bible and Animal, Vegetable, Mineral are high on my list now), but the luncheon talk with her was probably worth the price of the whole conference. She talked about “That Damn Africa Book,” or what she called The Poisonwood Bible when she was working on it for years and years, as well as how introverted writers who become famous are rewarded with lots and lots of attention and public appearances. Heh. Her talk was delightful and inspiring.

#6-Publishing People are Passionate People

Another session that might have been worth the cost of admission was Industry Update where aforementioned self-publishing guru Hugh Howey and traditional publishing leader Geoff Shandler duked it out.

Okay, the wonderful Jane Friedan was also in the session and every time she spoke it was poignant and insightful. She had an especially great comment falling between Hugh’s insistence that ebooks be priced lower and Geoff’s belief that that devalued the work. She said she wished pricing was more dynamic. Not all books are equal in terms of cost. I hadn’t thought about it this way, but I think she’s absolutely right. Why do we see all books across the board as having the same market value? Oh, and she also had that lovely, aforementioned, cheese cube comment….but on to the tension between Geoff and Hugh…

So, I felt like I was watching history as it happened seeing these two prominent poles in the publishing industry discuss the radical changes in said industry! They were both articulate and knowledgeable and they both completely and utterly disagreed with each other on almost everything.

But, if I could narrow down my biggest take away from the dispute, it was something Geoff said about how, within this debate, traditional publishing is sometimes villainized as a being all about business. Cold, hard business. And, yes, it is a business, but the professionals in traditional publishing could all probably be making a lot more money in any other industry. They chose publishing because they are passionate about books. And, from my own experience with my agent and the wonderful professionals at Carina Press, I can only applaud that sentiment. Book people are good people, whether they are advocating for self-publishing or traditional publishing or just trying to help authors either way.

And, never fear, in the end Hugh and Geoff hugged it out. Literally. Um, yeah, it was really cute. :)

And those are just the highlights of my trip. I met so many awesome writers and new friends. I can’t wait to go next year! :)

2 Comments

Should You Mention Your Diverse Cast in a Query

8/6/2014

20 Comments

I’m having so much fun critiquing Pitch Wars queries! Seriously, you all are very talented and I can’t wait to see my twitter stream blow up with your inevitable success stories. :)

One question that keeps coming up and I don’t have a great answer for is whether or not you should include that you have a diverse cast in your query.

Let’s get a few things out of the way first:

I’m not talking about main characters. If your main character has a diverse background, I’d slip that in to the query. Dear Editor has a good post on this. Basically, “It’s one more feature that distinguishes your project, and its current status on publishing’s radar only helps.”
I’m not talking about when a diverse element in a supporting character is vital to telling the plot. If we need to know that the MC’s brother is an amputee in order to get the plot, then we need to know that.
I’m not talking about when you query an agent or editor who has specifically asked for more diversity in books. For example, Eddie Schneider. In those cases, I’d say something like, “I noticed on the Jabberwocky website that you’re specifically interested in diverse casts. My main character's best friend is Latino...etc....”

What I’m talking about is when your cast is diverse but it’s not vital to know that to understand the story and you aren't querying an agent who specifically said they're looking for diverse casts.

All of my books have diverse love interests and friends. But, when I was querying, I felt like adding that was sort of like saying, “Oh, by the way, my book is realistic.” Heh. I didn’t think it needed to be said and I felt awkward patting myself on the back for, you know, reflecting the world. Aren’t we supposed to do that as writers? Additionally, while many of my characters have diverse aspects to them, those aspects don’t define them. Calling out just those attributes in the query, and not their other interesting and important attributes, felt weird.

However, maybe I was wrong! I can understand the argument that many books don’t have diverse casts (even those that don’t have compelling time/place reasons for it), so maybe it is advantageous to raise your hand and say, “Hey, fyi, my book is diverse.”

As I said, I’m not sure. I’d love to hear your thoughts on this and maybe that discussion can help some of you decide whether or not you should include it.

20 Comments

Pitch Wars Critiques

7/23/2014

7 Comments

As many of you know, Pitch Wars is coming up!

To thank my newsletter subscribers, I'm offering them critiques! If you aren't already a subscriber, that's okay, just sign up first and then send me either your query or your first page (250 words). Depending on the demand, it may take me a few days, so please be patient. :)

Also, please note I am NOT a Pitch Wars mentor, though I think it is a wonderful contest and I hope I get a chance to be a mentor in the future. Additionally, I will probably be most helpful to YA and NA writers, but I am happy to critique MG and Adult entries too.

I'm looking forward to seeing all the great Pitch Wars submissions!

7 Comments

#SFFPIT Critiques

6/10/2014

62 Comments

As many of you know, Dan Koboldt is hosting #sffpit tomorrow, a twitter pitch party just for scifi and fantasy writers.

If you're planning to pitch your novel and want to get feedback, post your twitter pitch below and I'll respond with my thoughts.

Of course, if others would like to chime in with feedback, feel free!

And if you want to hear about my other critique giveaways, be sure to sign up for my newsletter.

Good luck everyone!

62 Comments

#NALitChat-Book Marketing/Launch

5/22/2014

0 Comments

Here are a few quick takeaways I got from last week's #NALitChat discussion:

Goodreads ads and giveaways don't often translate to sales, but they do help with visibility
In general, Goodreads efforts and blog tours don't translate well to sales
I Love Vampire Novels is a good place to advertise NA Paranormal
Preorders are tricky as the Amazon algorithm doesn't count them the same way. While it's great to create buzz before the book is out and give people the option to buy it, you also want to focus on that first week of sales.
Pretty Links let you control your links. (So, before the launch it can go to your website and afterward it could go to Amazon, for example.)
In terms of launch schedule, you want your cover reveal to be about 6-9 weeks out and bloggers should have ARCs a month (or more) in advance.
Continue writing. Having and growing a backlist is a key to success. You aren't just promoting one book, you're promoting yourself as an author and it will take time.

I know I missed A LOT of other info in the chat, but these were the things that either surprised me, I hadn't heard before, or bear repeating so I took special note of them. I hope it's helpful! :)

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