New year’s resolutions: 2015 edition
Posted: December 30, 2014 Filed under: On Books, On me, On writing | Tags: Isla's Inheritance, Isla's Oath, Lucid Dreaming, Melpomene's Daughter, new year's resolutions, Tammy Calder, top ten tuesday 2 Comments
Top Ten Tuesday is a bookish meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish, and it is loads of fun. You should all partake of it. PARTAKE! (Please imagine I said that in my best Dalek voice.) This week’s theme is: “Top Ten Goals/Resolutions For 2015 — bookish, blogging or otherwise!”
I’ve discovered over the last two years that blogging about my goals is a really great way to hold myself accountable, and make sure I actually do the things I set out to do.
2014 recap
Celebrate the launch of Isla’s Inheritance in October (or thereabouts). Convince as many of you as possible to buy it. Check. Sort of. I dunno if I’ve convinced as many of you as possible. I mean, I haven’t paid people with kittens or threatened dire consequences if people don’t. But people
have read
it, and left nice reviews around the place. So I’m pretty happy about that.
Finish writing and editing the third book in Isla’s trilogy, so it’s ready to go to Turquoise Morning Press when they ask for it. Check. Right now, I’m actually halfway through re-reading it after the second-round edits from TMP. I really love this story, you guys. I know we’re not meant to have favourites among our children, but of the Isla’s Inheritance trilogy, the third book in the series, Melpomene’s Daughter, is definitely my favourite. Shh!
Find a home for Lucid Dreaming, whether that be via the agent/traditional press route or the small press route. This is the one resolution I have’t yet been successful on, for reasons that would require another blog post. But I have a plan of action. Hopefully I’ll be able to share something with you around the middle of next year. (By the way, there’s a lesson in this for everyone: don’t set goals that are outside your control. You can’t make people offer on your manuscripts, and sometimes people love them but don’t offer on them anyway, for market reasons or list reasons or whatever. Publishing is a tricky thing.)
Start writing something else. Possibly a sequel to Lucid Dreaming, although there’s that steampunk I’ve been thinking about for aaaages. I’m currently 18,000 words into the aforementioned steampunk, although the steampunk elements are actually pretty light. A year later, I describe it as historical fantasy. 🙂 I also self-published a novella under another pen name, Tammy Calder. It’s 8500 words long.
That means in 2014 I wrote…a lot of words. Probably in the order of 70,000, counting Melpomene’s Daughter, although I didn’t track it. And that doesn’t count blog posts and reviews. Whew. Chuck Wendig estimated he wrote 750,000 words this year, but we can’t all be Chuck, I guess! (I can’t even grow a beard.)
Read. I’ll set my Goodreads target to 40 again, see how it goes. Kicked this one out of the ballpark.
2015 goals
Reading goals
Read lots of books. I’ve set my Goodreads target to 40 again, with the caveat that childrens books and novellas don’t count. If I read 10 of those, I need to read 50 titles overall. Otherwise I have to wear the cone of shame.
Read a variety of Australian books. I’m also doing the Aussie Readers challenge over at Goodreads. For that, I need to read 12 books by Australian writers in 12 different genres. I’ll post my choices in a blog post in the new year. I’m looking forward to it — it’s a very exciting list!
Read books by Australian women. I’m also going to do the Australian Women Writers challenge again in 2015. There’s a lot of overlap between this list and number two, I confess — currently my Aussie readers challenge list only includes one bloke. Still, since this year I read and reviewed 11 books by Australian women, my plan for 2015 is to set my own goal of 15. I think I can do it, and it means this challenge is pushing me further than the previous one. Otherwise, what’s the point?
Writing and publishing goals
Release Isla’s Oath and Melpomene’s Daughter on time, with as much fanfare as I can manage. The former is scheduled for release on 20 January, and the latter for the week of 20 April (I don’t have an exact date). SO EXITE! Isla’s Oath is already available for preorder a
nd is on NetGalley, but I still have some promo stuff to finish off. And as I mentioned, Melpomene’s Daughter is still in the editing process. Busy busy busy.
Finish my historical fantasy. The four other novels (and even the novella) I’ve written have been urban fantasy, and the novels have all been in the first person. Switching to historical fantasy and the third person has required a massive change of gears. But I’ve wanted to tell this story for three years now, and the thrill of actually seeing it come to life is pretty high. Sure, there are growing pains, but that’s to be expected. And fixing it afterwards is what edits are for!
Give Lucid Dreaming the attention it deserves. I love this book, you guys. At least as much as Melpomene’s Daughter. I’ve neglected it a bit this year — having three books scheduled for release over the space of seven months does tend to eat up your time — but 2015 will be its year. I promise. *pats manuscript reassuringly*
Write another novella for Tammy Calder. Enough said about that. 😉
Blog at least twice a week. This will require some planning, since I’m going away to the coast with my son and some friends for a week at the end of January (a few days after Isla’s Oath comes out — oops), but I can do it. I don’t need to sleep, right?
What are your goals for this year, reading, writing or otherwise?
Publishing books is like investing, NOT like winning the lottery
Posted: December 22, 2014 Filed under: On writing | Tags: publishing, writing Leave a commentThis is a great analogy for a writing career. I’ve never really been someone that expected to win the lottery in any case!
Publishing books is like investing, NOT like winning the lottery.
Of course, we all wish it was. It would be nice to write your debut novel, see it published, and suddenly it becomes an overnight success, but chances are that’s not going to happen.
Hopefully, what really happens is that you write a book, gain some fans, make some sales, and write another book.
Each book you write is an investment in your future, and your career. When you save for retirement, do you put $100 on a stock and hope it grows to a million? Noooo. You save over time, build on what you have, and diversify your portfolio.
Publishing books is very similar. You have to keep writing books, keeping depositing into your writing portfolio, and keep growing your audience.
I realized this when I released the first two novellas in my Highborn Chroniclesa few months ago…
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Interview: Shelby C. Madison, Senior YA Acquisitions Editor
Posted: December 18, 2014 Filed under: On writing | Tags: aussie-owned, Interview, Turquoise Morning Press Leave a commentOn Tuesday at Aussie Owned and Read I interviewed Shelby C. Madison, the Senior YA Acquisitions Editor at Turquoise Morning Press. She’s the one that acquired the Isla’s Inheritance trilogy, so give her lots of love! ❤
In good news for those of you who might have a romance book (or one in another genre with romantic elements) looking for a publisher, Turquoise Morning press is opening to submissions on 1 January next year (and not just for YA!). Read more for details!
Today I’m interviewing Shelby C. Madison, the YA and NA editor at Turquoise Morning Press, or TMP. Shelby is the person that acquired my trilogy, so of course I luff her. ❤ If you’ve got a romance novel looking for a home, or a book in another genre, but with romantic elements, this may well be of interest to you!
TMP has just opened up its books to submissions from 1 January 2015. What sort of genre or genres are you looking for? Is there anything that is a no go?
I mainly deal with young adult, with the occasional new adult submission. As a whole, TMP looks for engaging stories with strong female protagonists. Within your non-traditional romance genres, like mystery or crime fiction, we like a romantic element to play out in the story. We find these characteristics engage our readers. Check out our submissions page for more…
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By Your Request: Query Success Stories and Why They Were Successful — AoR Ladies
Posted: December 2, 2014 Filed under: On writing | Tags: aussie-owned, Isla's Inheritance, pitches, queries, writing Leave a commentWant to see the query that landed me a contract with Turquoise Morning Press? I’m sharing it today over at Aussie Owned.
Recently I asked you, our readers, what you wanted to see. The answer I received was about querying successfully, how to do it, and examples of successful queries. So today, I have the ladies here, at AOaR telling their stories.
Cass!
First off, I should warn you that the query letter contains a minor spoiler for the book. (There was also a bigger one in there, but I’ve deleted it from the example; I don’t think it’s strictly necessary to illustrate the point.)
There are a few reasons why I think this query was successful. I followed a basic when/then structure in the pitch (the first two paragraphs). When Isla’s life starts to spin off the rails, then she must discover the truth about who she is and what she can do. It also outlines the stakes: Isla’s father is in danger and needs rescuing. (He’s such
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The waiting game
Posted: November 13, 2014 Filed under: On writing | Tags: aussie-owned, queries, writing Leave a commentOn Tuesday over at Aussie Owned and Read, I wrote about the various writing-related ways I distract myself from going crazy while I wait for writing-related things. 🙂
I’m an impatient person. (I will pause here while you express shock at this statement… WHY AREN’T YOU EXPRESSING SHOCK?) I’ve always been that way, and it’s something I’ve had to learn to manage over the years. So, as I’m sure you can imagine, writing and publishing books is a special kind of torture for me.
The publishing industry is a slow-moving beast. Even if you disregard how long it takes me to draft a novel in the first place—I’m jealous of you speedy NaNoWriMo types—so much of publishing is waiting. Waiting for beta feedback. Waiting for responses to queries. Waiting for edits, and covers, and publication dates. And now Isla’s Inheritance has finally been released into the wild, I’ve discovered a new thing to wait for: reviews.
It’s possible to be waiting for all these things AT THE SAME TIME. If you’re a writer, you have probably discovered this…
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NaNoWriMo musings, and a pep talk
Posted: November 7, 2014 Filed under: On writing | Tags: NaNoWriMo, writing Leave a comment
Confession: when I first heard of NaNoWriMo, I was quietly horrified. (NaNoWriMo, if you’re wondering, is National Novel-Writing Month, a challenge where participants attempt to write 50k words during the month of November.) This was years ago, before I’d even started Isla’s Inheritance, the first novel I successfully completed.
There’s no doubt that jealousy was a factor—at the time, none of my ideas had progressed beyond random thought bubbles, and I had deep-seated doubts about my own ability to sit down and actually write a novel.
Past Cass was very insecure.
But the other factor for me was a fundamental misunderstanding about the point of NaNoWriMo. I hadn’t really internalised the fact that first drafts are generally, well, not very good, and so I objected that the results of these month-long word sprints couldn’t possibly be edited to be publishable in that time. (Most NaNoWriMo participants realise this too, although there are some that just send off their completed draft to an agent or agents on 1 December. If you’re thinking along those lines, DO NOT DO THIS!)
These days I think NaNoWriMo is largely a good thing.
For people that participate, there’s no doubt that it demands a certain level of discipline. Don’t feel inspired? Tough. Butt in the chair, fingers on the keyboard. Can’t write today? You’ll have to write twice as much tomorrow to catch up. It’s a great way to beat procrastination. And for some people that motivation, the fact they’re being held accountable in public (on the NaNo website and by any friends they’ve told), can be just what they need.
Also, even as a non-NaNoWriMo participant (NoNoWriMo?), I’ve found the flurry of moral support among the writing community on social media both heartening and inspirational.
If you’re wondering why I say NaNoWriMo is only largely a good thing, rather than unequivocally, the reason is that the kind of frenzied writing required for NaNo isn’t going to be for everyone. For those people, I expect the best way to benefit from NaNoWriMo is to make the daily or weekly writing goal a habit, so that at the end of November you can keep it going once the pressure drops off. It doesn’t even need to be the 1667 words a day that NaNoWriMo demands. Even if you write 500 words a day, you’ll have a 90k word novel in less than six months.
And then you can start editing. 😉
Even though I understand it better, I still don’t do NaNoWriMo. Sadly, being a single parent that works full time means I can’t find the hours a day that this sort of writing would require. But these days I’m jealous of those that can take part. I do have a minimum word goal but it’s a paltry 2000 words per week—which means it would take me almost a year to write that 90k word novel. (I often write more than this in a week, mind you; that’s just the least I’ll accept from myself.)
To those doing NaNoWriMo who may be struggling, remember: if you don’t get to 50k by 30 November—if you get 40k or 25k or 5k—you haven’t “failed”. You’ve started a novel. Keep writing.
Go, you good things.
Why Alphas Aren’t First in My Book
Posted: October 6, 2014 Filed under: On Books, On writing | Tags: guest post, romance 2 CommentsI was going to write a blog post about alpha males and how they aren’t really for me, but then Nicole Evelina wrote one and I figured I’d just copy off her homework. Check her post out, you guys. I luff it. ❤
For generations, women have been taught that the ideal hero of a novel – regardless of genre, but especially in romance – is the alpha male. You know the type: tan, perfectly muscled, ruggedly handsome, can go all night, likely to appear oiled up/sweaty on the cover.*
I’d like to challenge that stereotype. Actually, I am in most of my books (King Arthur, and Lancelot to an extent, being exceptions because of their existing characteristics).
Why? Well for one, I am so not attracted to the alpha male – it’s part of the reason I don’t like romance novels. Physically, I’ve always gone for what I call the “heroin chic” look: skinny, may or may not have muscles, usually tall. (I think it comes from too many years of hanging out with musicians.) I like someone who won’t crush me under his weight or break me in a passionate embrace…
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This Writer’s Space: Jen Streck
Posted: August 27, 2014 Filed under: On writing | Tags: this writer's space 1 Comment
Today on This Writer’s Space I have Jen Streck, half of the team at The Dragon Blog. Take it away, Jen! 🙂
Where I Write
In reality, I write almost anywhere – planes, hotels, football practice, sitting in my car in a parking lot, the list could go on for some time. That being said, my home office is one the places I love to write. Early in the morning, over lunch, or in the evenings when I can manage to hide for a while after work, this is my space.
When I’m here, I have all the staples. I use Scrivener for writing, and usually have it set with a split screen for the current scene plus whatever character picture is relevant for the scene I’m writing. In this example it is Dylan, the hero in my contemporary romance, dream cast as Tom Hiddleston. The other staple is the Google Hangouts window with my sister, Mel. She is there as my ever present source of miscellaneous feedback, random chatting, and anything else I might need
Aside from the computer, there is the ever present Psychocat prepared to shred me to pieces, the Diet Sunkist to keep me awake, the notebook and pen for random notes, and Peep and Gumby (their twins reside with Mel).
Where I’m Inspired
It was hard to narrow this topic down to one thing. I have a writing playlist that provides a great source of inspiration; however, one of the places I’m often able to work through scenes or ideas is out on a walk with my dog. Sometimes when I’m stuck the best thing I can do is throw on my headphones with the aforementioned playlist, grab the dog, and head out the door. The fresh air and limited interruptions do wonders for my thought process. On a similar note, on days I commute into the office I’m almost always thinking through pieces of the story.
To Be Read
My TBR list is always a mile long. Since I read mostly ebooks these days, my Goodreads list is the best representation. Sometimes I think for every book I read I’m adding two more to the list. This is compounded by the fact that I write the Psychocat Reads Book Reviews for the Dragon Blog. I suppose the upside of writing the reviews is that I have a justifiable reason why I must make time to read. 🙂
Currently I’m reading We Own the Night by Kristen Strassel, though by the time this post goes live there’s no telling which book I’ll be reading.
About Jen
Jen spends her days stuck in corporate captivity, but devotes a good portion of her free time to reading, writing book reviews, and ever so slowly writing a contemporary romance novel. She is one half of the Sassy Sisters on Fire (yes they are actually sisters) at The Dragon Blog, where she and Mel manage to get into all matters of mischief.
You can find Jen on Twitter (@jlstreck), Pinterest (Check out writing inspiration boards, fandom boards, and cool fun stuff here.), and prowling around The Dragon Blog (melissapetreshock.com/the-dragon-blog).
Hyphens: a quick and dirty guide, by the Hyphenator
Posted: August 25, 2014 Filed under: On writing | Tags: punctuation, writing Leave a commentIt’s been a while—over a year—since I’ve “treated” you guys to a blog post about punctuation. I’ve blogged about dashes (em rules and en rules) before, and also semicolons. Today I want to talk about the dash’s smaller cousin, the hyphen. At work they call me the Hyphenator, which isn’t as lame as it sounds. Ok, it’s probably exactly as lame, but I really love a correctly used hyphen, almost as much as a correctly used semicolon.
I suppose I should just be grateful they don’t call me the Colonator.
Now, I could save you time by pointing out that at least 50% of the time, when I have a question about hyphenation, my first port of call is my trusty old (actually new) dictionary. Words are always changing, and even between dictionary editions a word won’t necessarily be spelled the same way. Words that work as a pair often evolve from being two words to two words with a hyphen to one word. For example, a few years ago a word like “counterterrorism” was spelled “counter-terrorism”, but the hyphen has been worn away with the word’s frequent use over the last decade.
The other 50% of the time, when the thing you’re looking at hyphenating isn’t one word but two or several working as a compound modifier, whether you need a hyphen is a judgement call. The more-common examples will be in the dictionary, but more-unusual ones won’t.
Compound modifiers
A modifier is typically an adjective or adverb, and a compound modifier is (unsurprisingly) a modifier made up of two or more words. Most of the time when I see them they are adjectives; I can’t think of any compound adverb examples off the top of my head, but I won’t rule the possibility out because the English language is a tricksy thing.
Here are some examples:
- My long-term goals include becoming a bestseller.
- She gazed at the blue-green sea.
- I have a five-year-old son.
- I’ve got that I-can’t-think-of-any-more-examples feeling.
In all these instances, the bolded words are a compound adjective modifying a noun. Not every word I’ve bolded is an adjective itself, but working together, they form one. Importantly, the compound adjectives are all sitting before the noun. In this instance, I almost always hyphenate the modifiers.
If, however, the sentences were written with the adjectives after the noun, you don’t hyphenate them: “My goals for the long term include becoming a bestseller.” (Yeah, good luck with that.)
Exceptions to hyphenating compound modifiers
There are two reasons I wouldn’t hyphenate a compound modifier even when it’s before a noun. One is when the meaning is clear without the hyphen, and the other is when it changes the meaning of the sentence to add a hyphen.
An example I frequently see is a construction where the modifier to the noun is actually an adverb and a verb, such as “the quickly running boy”. In that instance I wouldn’t hyphenate, simply because there’s no possibility of the reader misunderstanding. “Quickly” can only be modifying “running”, not “boy”.
Here’s another example I see at work a lot:
- I will read the most popular books.
- I will read the most-popular books.
The first says that I will read more popular books than anyone else, while the second says I will read only the books that are bestsellers. In that case, whether you hyphenate or not depends on what you’re trying to convey. Sometimes it’s better to reword to avoid ambiguity; for example, some people might misread the first sentence as having the second meaning, even without the hyphen, because they don’t know what a pedant I am for hyphens. If I reworded to say “I will read more popular books than anyone else”, there’s no chance they’ll misunderstand.
Hyphenating numbers and ages
Ages: In my first examples, I included one about my son being five. That sentence would work the same way whether I wrote it with or without the word “son”, because ages are written with hyphens. (The exception is if there is a noun and the age sits after it in the sentence.)
- I have a five-year-old son.
- I have a five-year-old.
- My son is five years old.
Numbers: Numbers written in full are always hyphenated where they are more than one word (so from twenty-one onwards).
As an aside, when you switch from writing in full to using digits depends on the style you’re using—at work we write words for whole numbers from one to nine and then use digits from 10 onwards. Most other places it’s whole numbers from one to ninety-nine. There is one exception to using digits beyond a certain number, though. If the number starts a sentence, it should be written in full—so if you have the number 28563 at the start of a sentence, you might want to reword to put something in front of it, or it’s gonna get ugly.
There is more I could write about hyphens, but this post is already on the long side and I’m sure that you’ve all fallen asleep anyway. If you haven’t, high five!
Interview: Vincent Morrone, YA and NA author
Posted: August 23, 2014 Filed under: On Books, On writing | Tags: aussie-owned, Interview, small presses Leave a commentIn case you missed it, last Tuesday I interviewed Vincent Morrone over at Aussie Owned and Read.
With me today is Vincent Morrone author of young and new adult fiction (including an urban fantasy, which everyone who knows me will be aware is my favourite and my best).Welcome, Vincent!
Your two books are a contemporary new adult, Just Breathe, and an urban fantasy young adult, Vision of Shadows. What drew you to these different genres? Do you have a favourite? (Genre to write, that is; I’m not asking you to choose between your book babies. You know, unless you want to.)
Vincent Morrone
It’s not as much the genre as it is the story of each. I like romance, but to me there has to be more than straightforward romance. I need there to be a paranormal aspect or a killer on the loose or something else going on.
I’m also a fan of characters and both Vision of Shadows and Just Breathe have…
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Cassandra Page 