Lead Me Gently, Author...

by Cat Woods

When I open a book, I embark on a magical journey. The path is set before me, and page by page, I explore a new world until I reach the destination at The End. If I'm lucky, I will walk away changed somehow. Your words will have touched some inner part of me and asked me to evaluate and re-evaluate the way I live my life and the way I see the world. It will challenge me to be a better person, one more cognizant of the people and places around me. It will fill some small part of me I didn't know was empty.

And so I ask, lead me gently, author, and I will follow.

Help me discover amazing gems off the beaten path.

But please, please, please do not tell me what you want me to know.

Rather, let me attach my own meaning to your words. Ignite my senses so I can take away what I need from your writing. Help me feel your book in my heart and soul, not just swallow the sustenance you believe I need.

Tread carefully and don't moralize. Let your characters grow so that I may, too.

Guide me, don't instruct me.
Share without preaching.

Dear Author, I've been told that readers are lazy, that they need you to draw them a map from Point A to Point B. That assumption scares me. It means you are responsible for making the reading experience equal for every reader. It means there would be no need for book discussions because we've all walked in each other's footsteps over the same rocky terrain with our eyes trained on a sole destination. It means we will miss the greatest opportunity to look past the words and see between the lines.

We will miss not only the forest, but also the trees.
We will fail to see the magic hiding right beside us.

And so I ask, dear author, don't give your ending away on page one, and don't beat me over the head with your message.
Don't foreshadow so much...

...that you ruin the surprise.

Your book isn't a soap box.
It's a gift to the world.

Treat it as such.

How do you share your passion without crossing the line? At what point do we risk losing our readers to a pedantic attitude? When is it our job to connect the dots, and when do we allow readers to make their own connections? Is it important that our readers understand and feel exactly what we want them to, or is it more important that they walk away from our writing with the message they need?

Curious minds want to know.

Cat is an avid hiker and lover of all things amazing. She enjoys exploring off-the-beaten-path with her daughter in State Parks across the upper Midwest and thinks that regardless of the destination, the journey is half the fun. When she's not hiking in the woods, she's blogging at Words from the Woods or writing juvenile lit from her little house on the prairie.

Writer's Dreamland: the good, the bad and the ugly

by Cat Woods

A few weeks ago, I received a message in my inbox. It came from an editor I was courting about a chapter book series. I was on my phone at the time, and the message with the first few words popped up on my screen:

What are you, a deaf mute?

A second later, another email popped up from a different editor:

You have an inflated sense of self.

I can't begin to describe the feelings that washed over me. Terror, confusion, anger...I was literally sweating and couldn't force myself to open the email to read the scathing rejections I knew were coming my way.

You see, we writers bust our butts to do things right. We work hard to balance story, plot, character, description and dialogue. We want to woo our agents, editors and public with our wonderful words. What we don't want is a rejection so hurtful we never pick up our pens again.

I rolled over and snuggled closer to Dear Hubby, thankful my nightmare was nothing more than a dream.

Ah, I know what you're thinking. I just cheated you out of a good rejection story. I started my piece with a dream, which is a huge no-no 99.9% of the time. But this dream happened to be real and since it isn't the opening scene of a novel I'm trying to pitch, I thought we could dissect it together, as I'm a huge proponent of believing my dreams.

So, long story short, I am a pretentious deaf-mute. At least according to the monsters trolling my sleep. Or am I?

Instead of letting my dream ruffle my writing feathers, I took the rejections seriously. What about my writing could possibly make me seem like a deaf mute? The answer was actually quite simple. I am a sparse writer in regards to description. I tend to favor the less is more approach and let my readers fill in the details with their own imaginations. (Personally, I feel my dream rejection would have been more solid if it had called me a blind mute, but beggars can't be choosy, and dream editors apparently aren't perfect.)

That said, I had something solid to consider before actually sending my submission out to the editor I want to woo.

That's the good part of dreams. If we stop a second to consider what our subconscious is trying to tell us, we may just learn a thing or two.

The bad part of dreams: dreams are so tempting to use in our writing because we dream every time our heads hit the pillow. Dreams are an integral part of our night life. They help us sort through problems. They lend us support and can be a huge source of inspiration. It is an easy trap to start stories with dreams, solve our MC's problems with dreams or to finish off a plot line with the whole "it was nothing more than a bad dream" solution. Readers tend to hate these devices, and for good reason. They are over-used and seldom done in a way that doesn't feel trite. Often, readers feel cheated out of a good story.

The ugly: dreams can be dream killers. Inflated sense of self. What the heck does that mean? I try to be humble. I don't like to be snobby or snotty or pretentious. And while I know that good intentions don't always work out the way we want them to and that we mere mortals tend to be really bad judges of our own characters, I'm not quite sure how to interpret this dreamy tidbit.

Inflated sense of self.

That really hurts. It rubs raw my self confidence and makes me second guess what I'm doing and why. It makes me want to stuff the submission package I've been laboring over into a huge e-file and leave it there for the cyber monkeys to steal the next time they are being naughty.

Inflated sense of self.

This terrifies me. Does it mean that my writing sucks? Or that my subconscious is begging me to quit planning a series when I'm incapable of following through? I have no idea: I was too busy sweating and trembling and being too much of a baby to open the dreammail and find out.

All I really know is that dreams have an ugly side that has nothing to do with trying to run away from a murderer and not being able to move our legs. They have the uncanny ability to make us second guess ourselves and believe things that may or may not have any truth in them.

As writers, it's ironic that our waking dreams of hitting it big can clash so painfully with our night terrors. Finding the right balance is crucial to our success--and our sanity.

So, dear readers, what writerly dreams have haunted you? How much stock do you put in your dreams, and how do you let them affect your writing? How, if ever, have you used a dream in your writing? What are your pet peeves when reading about dreams in novels?

Curious minds want to know.

Cat Woods loves to dream. In college, she kept a dream journal for her psych class and found that her subconscious is as quirky as her waking self. She also learned that her uncanny ability to change her dreams is called lucid dreaming. She'd been "changing the channel" on her nightmares since she was bit in the foot by a wolf in the second grade, and thought that doing so was normal. Alas, nothing about Cat is normal except her dream to write. For a peek into her whimsical life, you can find her at Word from the Woods or Cat 4 Kids.

Learning to Rewrite

by Jemi Fraser

For me learning to rewrite a draft was NOT an easy road.

Stage #1 - Complete Ignorance

• in my first rewrite, I had no idea what I was doing. I went through the draft, fixed all the typos, tweaked some sentences, and was daring enough to eliminate a couple of paragraphs here and there
• then I met some amazing folks over at Agent Query Connect and learned that a rewrite should be a slightly more intense process

Stage #2 - Gaining Confidence

• the next step in my journey was realizing that everything I'd written in my first drafts didn't have to be included in the final draft. I could take out entire scenes. I could move entire scenes. Change pov.
• these realizations actually shocked me, and took me a while to wrap my head around 
• at this point, I carefully saved each new 'draft' with a date indicating the changes

Stage #3 - Gaining Crit Buddies

• this changed my world and burst my naive little bubble. And I will be forever grateful.
• I learned that a rewrite involved more than the tweaking I'd been doing.
• reaching deep down into the story was pretty tough. I was faced with some big realizations. Probably the biggest one was that external conflict isn't enough. There needed to be internal conflict too. For both my MCs (I write romance).
• this involved re-reading and re-writing scene by scene, making changes, keeping track of changes, making notes, deleting favourite scenes & lines, adding conflict (lots and lots of adding conflict)
• I no longer saved drafts, only the main one, with a folder (I'd discovered Scrivener at this point) with the very few scenes I though I might want to reuse or rescue somehow

Stage #4 - A Real Rewrite

• I tried my Stage 3 version of rewriting for several of my novels, and found it very discouraging. Several stories I know have tons of potential were languishing. I also discovered Stage 3 is HARD. Very hard. For me, a million times more difficult than writing a first draft.
• brainwave!
• I decided to dump all my chapters and scenes into a new Scrivener folder titled Draft 1
• because I love (LOVE!!) writing first drafts, I decided to treat Draft 2 like a Draft 1
• I rewrote the draft from scratch. At first I found it tough to not peek at the first draft, but it definitely got easier. The changes I needed to make were core changes and because of that, the story changed dramatically, while keeping the same basic plot elements, and I already knew those plot elements, so I didn't peek.

Stage #5 - Unknown

• as I'm evolving as a writer, I know my style will change too
• I've got 5 or 6 stories begging for rewrites (I was stuck fast in Stages 2 & 3 for far too long) and at this point I'm nearly salivating wanting to do a Stage 4 rewrite for each of them
• I wonder if I'll have discovered Stage 5 by the time I get to them all?

Learning to write well (and to rewrite well) is a personal journey. My journey will probably look nothing like yours, but I hope by sharing mine, you might find some ideas to help you move along to the next step. Or suggestions as to what Stage 5 might look like for me!

Do you rewrite? Do your rewrites look anything like mine?

Jemi Fraser is an aspiring author of contemporary romance. She blogs  and tweets while searching for those HEAs.

I’m A Writer (No, Really): The Problem with “Aspiring"

by Paul Krueger

One of the cool things about my adopted home of Los Angeles is that everyone here’s got a secret identity. That waitress over there? Right now, she’s waiting to hear from her agent about that Scorsese feature she got called back for. The guy on the other end of your tech support call? He’s been putting short films up on YouTube for years, and in a few months one of them is going to be absolutely everywhere. And me? I’m a writer.

I used to garnish that introduction with a, “No, really,” at parties, when the people I was talking to would barely stop themselves from rolling their eyes. Not that I can blame them; I’m sure by now they’ve met very few writers, but plenty of “writers.” It’s a frustration we all run into: we practice a craft, take it seriously, spend hours a day perfecting our technique, and some jackass with a copy of Word she hasn’t touched in years gets to saunter on up next to us and call us her peer if she feels like it...and there’s nothing we can do to contradict her.

But if you ask me, that’s kind of what’s great about writing.

Back when I first started publicly labeling myself a writer, I attached a label to that label: “aspiring.” It was how I hedged my bets: I could float the writer thing out there in the hope that people would take me seriously, then hide behind my semantics shield when they inevitably didn’t. But looking back on it, I think calling myself an “aspiring” writer was one of the first and most persistent mistakes I made when I was starting out. Fortunately, though, it was also one of the most easily corrected. And my solution is this: if you’re writing--really writing, not just talking about it--you’re not aspiring.

One of the turning points in my relationship with my work was during a phone conversation with my dad. I’d just moved to LA, and was spending my days digging for jobs and writing as fast as my fingers would let me. And that particular afternoon, a spate of fresh rejections had rolled in for the novel I’d been trotting around then. So by the time my dad got to me, I was in a fine, fine mood.

“What the hell has it all been for?” I said to him, except I totally didn’t say ‘hell.’ “All this work I’m doing...it’s not going anywhere. It doesn’t mean anything.”

My dad immediately said, “That’s not true.” When I reacted with characteristic incredulity, he continued: “All the writing you do is work, and you’re not going to get anywhere unless you do it. It matters. It means something.”

I stopped calling myself an aspiring writer after that phone call.

I’ve sat through plenty of charlatans prattling on about the Great American Novel percolating between their ears, if they could just find the time or the inspiration to write the thing. When I was younger, I resented them. They made me feel like I had to apologize for and explain away the thing I loved, and how dare they. Now, though, I’ve come to a new understanding. I write, and I know I write, and that’s enough. I don’t have to prove anything, and neither do you. Your words are all the proof you need. If you’ve got those to offer up, then congratulations. You’re a writer.

And of course, there are still plenty of things you can aspire to be: a professional. A bestseller.

Or perhaps loftiest of all: a good writer.

So what do you think, guys? Am I onto something? Am I full of it? Take to the comments section and vent your spleen!

Paul Krueger wrote the upcoming NA urban fantasy, The Devil's Water Dictionary (Quirk Books, 2016). His short fiction has appeared in the 2014 Sword & Laser Anthology, Noir Riot vol. 1, and in his copy of Microsoft Word. You're most likely to find him on Twitter, where he's probably putting off something important.

Perfect Writing: is it attainable?

by Cat Woods

As a writer, finding that perfect word is almost as exhilarating as winning the lottery. Actually, in a way, it is winning the lottery--in a literary sense. You see, we writers take our words very seriously. We want to tell the perfect story with the perfect characters living the perfect plot that ends with the perfect resolution. We expect nothing but the perfect sentences flowing into paragraphs of perfection.

However, I don't believe that perfect writing is attainable. More importantly, I don't think it is desirable.

As a speech coach, I judge a lot of high school tournaments. I watch hundreds of talented kids recite amazing pieces week in and week out for three months straight. I admire the skill they have in memorization, characterization, blocking and inflection. They use facial expressions and body language to depict the emotions and elicit sighs of sadness or peals of laughter from their audiences. The better they connect to their characters and the better they help us connect to them, the better the speechies do.

Alas, however, I have seen technically perfect pieces executed in an over-rehearsed fashion that lacks genuine voice, effectively erasing all the hard work they've done.

This--this striving for perfection--is actually the problem with chasing it. We can, and often do, sacrifice quality, spontaneity and authenticity when we hash and rehash our work, kneading it, massaging it, substituting words and punctuation with a tenacity that is nearly obsessive.

In short, we risk losing genuine voice in the quest for perfection.

So, do you feel perfection is desirable or attainable in writing? If so, how do you pull it off? How do you keep your writing fresh despite the grueling hours of edits and revisions? Conversely, in what ways does the quest for perfection inhibit your storytelling? What do you do about it?

Curious minds want to know.

Cat Woods is a speech ninja five months out of the year. She helps junior high and varsity students hone their speaking skills--both on and off paper--a process that is eerily reminiscent of critiquing other writers. Feel free to critique her writing in Tales from the Bully Box, an anthology for middle grade writers from Elephant's Bookshelf Press. Or, check out her kid blogs at www.catwoodskids.com or www.thebullybox.com.

Writing Rituals (Dangers and Benefits)

By Charlee Vale

The question comes up everywhere for writers: in interviews, at events, one-on-one. It can take different and varying forms. 'Do you have something you need to have while writing?' 'What does your daily process look like?' 'Do you listen to music while you write?'

These questions, while they have slightly different answers, are trying to get to a root question: Do you have an writing rituals?

We're fascinated by rituals. We want to know what works for other so that maybe we'll pick up a spark of genius that might work for us. We want to wonder and marvel at the peculiarities and the simplicities of the way others work. Perhaps we want validation for our own set of unique rituals. There's an entire book dedicated to the rituals and practices of famous writers and artists. (It's actually very cool) You can find it here.

But what drives writing rituals, and do they help us or harm us? I don't have a definitive answer. I only have my own experience to draw from, in which the answer was: both.

During the Summer of 2013, I had a book that poured out of me like no book I had written before. I was writing anywhere from 2-5,000 words a day. For me, that's crazy.

Now, I tend towards the disorganized in my personal space. 'A place for everything' has never been, and never will be my motto. However, as I've gotten older I've noticed that I focused and am far more productive when I do a several things: Sit upright at a desk or table, have a clean work environment, and have noise canceling headphones on with my music. I also love tea to no end, so I would always make tea when I wrote.

I don't know if it was a conscious or subconscious thing, but those things quickly arranged themselves into a ritual. I would go to the kitchen and put on water for tea. Then I would go back to my writing space/room and make the bed. Then I would clean up anything that happened to be on the floor, and then the desk. When that was finished I would go and make the tea, and then sit down to write.

By itself that seems pretty harmless. However, it quickly became clear to me that I was associating my productivity and creativity with this ritual. I had to do it. If I didn't, how would I write? How would I be able to continue putting out this amazing level of words if I didn't keep doing things the way I had been doing them?

That right there is the danger of ritual. When we rely on an outside source to make sure we have our creativity, it becomes a problem. I stopped doing those things in that order, and spoiler alert, I'm just fine. So is my writing.

That's not to say that I didn't learn anything. I now know that the act of making tea helps me clear my mind after a difficult day. I know that having a clean workspace helps me, and that motivates me to keep it clean all the time instead of rushing to do it before my productive hours. Those things are a healthy boost to my creativity, though my creativity doesn't depend on them.

Let me know in the comments if you have any rituals, and what things you think really help you!

Charlee Vale is a Young Adult writer, bookseller, photographer, and tea lover living in New York City. You can also find her at her website, on Novel Thoughts, on Twitter, resisting the urge to make her bed obsessively. 

A Season of Reflection

by J. Lea López

Source

Many of us just finished with the hectic schedule of NaNoWriMo (did you win??) and now December will bring different, but not fewer, obligations. Starting with Thanksgiving at the end of November for our American members and readers, and continuing through the end of December, this is often a season of reflection and reassessment. We spend holidays like Hanukkah, Christmas, and New Years with family and friends. Social calendars fill up. We eat too much. Maybe drink too much. We kiss under mistletoe and exchange gifts with everyone from coworkers to lovers. We reflect back on the year that is drawing to a close and think ahead to the year that will be here before we know it.

For these reasons, we have decided to continue with our blogging break until January. In addition to spending much needed time with our families and friends and individually assessing our own writing goals, we here at From the Write Angle will take the month of December to reflect on how far FTWA has come and where we want to go from here. As always, we invite and appreciate any feedback on what you've liked in the past and what you'd love to see from us in the future. If you'll stick with us, there may be some fun things in it for you when the new year rolls around.

We hope you'll take this time to refresh and rejuvenate yourselves as well. Be charitable. Be kind. Be open to change. Be loving and caring. Be present in life. Be social. Be introspective. Be quiet. Be your own number one fan. Be and do all the things we sometimes forget to do when we let life sweep us up in the current.

But most of all, be here on January 1, 2015, ready to face the new year with a renewed sense of passion, and maybe even a makeover. See you then!

J. Lea López is an author who strives to make you laugh at, fall in love with, cry over, and lust after the characters she writes. She welcomes online stalkers as long as they're witty and/or adulatory. Kidding. Maybe. Check for yourself: Twitter, Facebook, Blog.

PENCILS DOWN: Finding Your Center In A Post-Project World

by Paul Krueger

Last week, I hit SAVE on the last developmental draft of my book and sent it screaming for my editrix’s inbox like the literary cruise missile it is.  It was the third draft I’d completed this year, but that did nothing to diminish the thrill.

So right now, I’m still high on post-draft fumes.  I’ve dived into my Netflix to-do list with gusto, and I’ve begun re-establishing contact with my friends to remind them that I, in fact, exist.  But those fumes are about to run dry, and I’ll be left sitting here and wondering what the hell to do with my hands.

So before my end-of-The Graduate mood sets in, I’m going to take a moment to highlight the best way to keep yourself sane between projects.

Don’t Write Anything.

If you’re like me, your brain’s constantly overflowing with ideas you can’t wait to get on paper.  If we’re being honest, you probably won’t live long enough to use every idea you’ve got now, let alone the ones you’ll get down the line.  So now that this Athena has sprung from your head and onto your copy of Scrivener, you’re probably eager to get to the next one in line.

Yeah, don’t do that.

The fact is, you just ran a freaking marathon.  And you know what happened to the first person who ever ran a marathon?  He died right when he finished, using his last breath to christen a nascent sporting goods corporation.  You, presumably, have lived through your mental marathon, but you know what’s a great way to make yourself keel over and mentally die?  Attempting another, right away.  Don’t be afraid to take a breath.  Or two.  Or however many you take in the span of a month.

Ah, but then the anxiety starts to set in, doesn’t it?  You’ve had this parasite perched in your brainpan for the past however long, and all of a sudden you don’t remember quite how to function without it leeching away your idle thoughts.  You’re used to feeling productive, and every second you’re not making something, you feel a creeping sense of Puritanical guilt over it.  Or you’re busy resenting a stranger on the internet, because he seems to be making an awful lot of assumptions about how your mind works.

But on the off-chance you are, in fact, like me, I have a second piece of advice:

Do Literally Anything Else.

The first time I finished a novel, I took up carpentry.  Last time, I flew to Chicago and spent a weekend in my friend’s basement recording an album.  Right now I’m failing very hard at drawing, and loving every moment of it.  Next time, I might pick up a dead language.  I might get back into fencing.  I might take up traveling from one small town to another, solving mysteries and unmasking “ghosts” that were really just cover-ups of shady land deals.  The point is, I’m doing something other than the thing that just wrung my brain within an inch of its life.

But I’d be lying if I told you I wasn’t counting down the days until I could dive back in.

Paul Krueger is the author of the NA urban fantasy The Devil's Water Dictionary (Quirk Books, 2015). His short fiction has appeared in the 2013 Sword & Laser Anthology, and also in his copy of Microsoft Word. You're most likely to find him on Twitter, where he's probably putting off something important.

Writing Without a Safety Net

by Matt Sinclair

In our busy lives, it's often hard to maintain a routine. I'm a creature of routine, yet I am often guilty of letting even important tasks fall through a crack.

For me, a simple approach is often best: a list of tasks to do for a day and perhaps another for the week ahead and just the weekend. Bullet points riddle my life:

• Edit 10 pages of manuscript
• Finish article
• Write 500 words on new manuscript

Those types of things sound like work. Not only am I not necessarily getting paid for all of them, they are in addition to what my day-to-day job entails.

A single minor catastrophe -- a sick child, an unscheduled meeting, a flat tire -- can quickly put the kibosh on writing time.

Are you a creature of routine? How do you rejigger your schedule when the real world interrupts your fictional ones?

Matt Sinclair, a New York City-based journalist and fiction writer, is also president and chief elephant officer of Elephant's Bookshelf Press, which is hours away from publishing Battery Brothers, a YA novel by Steven Carman about a pair of brothers playing high school baseball and about overcoming crippling adversity. Matt also blogs at the Elephant's Bookshelf and is on Twitter @elephantguy68.

Words Versus Resolutions: writing with your character in mind

by Cat Woods

Instead of resolutions to usher in the new year, I learned a neat trick from a fellow writer years ago: a word of the year.

The appeal of this word is that it has the power to change behaviors. Instead of "Lose Ten Pounds" which can be fraught with frustration and failure, the word "health" invokes positive connotations that impact more than the scale. I will eat better, work out more regularly, get more sleep and pay attention to my mental well-being. After a year of practicing health, I will have acquired the behavior patterns I want for a life time goal. After losing ten pounds, I might eat an entire bag of Doritos while mindlessly watching Sponge Bob reruns and crying into my diet soda. After all, I did lose ten pounds. I did accomplish my resolution.

When we write, it might behoove us to give words to our characters rather than just resolutions. While the immediacy of the resolutions and the very definitive outcome of them is what inherently drives the story and offers up our novel's conclusion, I like to think beyond the last page and into a possibility of life where my characters have changed, yet remain the same. I like to think of them as someone with integrity--in the sense that they are consistent in their behaviors and beliefs and actions. They are true to their core--whatever that core may be.

And so, I offer up the word.

• Harry Potter is tenacious. He refuses to back down until he has solved the riddle of his life. Sometimes this is a detriment. Other times it is admirable and courageous. Yet he never loses this core trait.
• Katniss Everdeen is virtuous. Her strong moral compass about the way humans should be treated drives every action she takes. Weary and terrified though she is, she holds onto her ideals to the point of stubbornness. Good, bad or indifferent, this trait is what makes Katniss one of the strongest female protagonists of this generation.
• Verity is ingenious, while her best friend is loyal in Code Name Verity.
• Curious George is...well, curious.
• And our own Mindy McGinnis's Lynn is independent.

Readers look to our characters for guidance. They want something deeper than a resolution. They want virtue and tenacity. They want independence, love, hope, faith and curiosity. They want to see themselves in the pages of our books so they can believe that they, too, can overcome the obstacles in their lives and survive beyond the moment.

And so I ask, give your readers a word...and maybe nab one for yourself.

Which character traits do you admire and why? How have you infused these traits into your writing? If you could only use one word to describe yourself at this moment in time, what would it be?

Curious minds want to know.

Cat Woods writes from home, often in her jammies with a mug of chai tea--not potato chips--and surely without the help of Sponge Bob. She wants you to know that no scales were harmed in the writing of this blog post--only egos--and that her word of the year is organization. As in plan and proceed, not declutter closets and junk drawers. Currently, she's the acquisitions editor for a middle grade anthology on bullying. You can find more of her whimsy (and guidelines for submitting) at Words from the Woods.

The Daily Grind

by Matt Sinclair

It’s become a basic truism that we all lead busy lives. Many of us struggle to eke out what writing time we can out of a day. I consider myself lucky to have a half hour or so on the train to read, write, edit, and organize my writing life. In fact, as I’m typing this blog the train is exiting the tunnel and about to cross a river. At times reminiscent of the opening sequence of The Sopranos, but it’s home…

Unless we're careful, it’s easy to get distracted from our writing routine. Sometimes that’s fine, as a writing mind is an exploring mind, and I don’t want to stunt anyone’s imagination. But at the same time, writers need to be able to focus and use their time wisely. A routine might seem like drudgery to some, but to others it's the only way things get done.

Perhaps the easiest way to approach that discipline is to write down things on a calendar and keep notes. But when there's so much going on, notes aren’t always enough. And as the old cliché goes, there are only so many hours in a day.

The future will only bring more change – some we must anticipate and some to which we must adapt quickly. I’m curious: how do you manage your time? Here at FTWA, we’ve posted a few blogs about whether we’re pantsers or planners when it comes to our writing. But what about when it comes to our lives?

Are we pantsers about when we write? I know lots of writers who plan to write a thousand words every day – usually to varying levels of success. But do you vary when you do that? Do you write in increments and squeeze fifteen minutes of writing here and another ten later and maybe a half hour just before or just after bed? Has that changed for you over the years?

Do you have specific days when you write? How easy or hard is it to get through your writing days? I know many writers aren’t able or don’t feel compelled to write every day. Trust me, I get it.

But do you know when you write your best? Are you able to optimize your peak writing moments?

What do you guys think? How do you approach that daily (or not quite daily) grind?

Matt Sinclair, a New York City-based journalist and fiction writer, is also president and chief elephant officer of Elephant's Bookshelf Press, which recently published Summer's Edge and Summer's Double Edge, which are available through Smashwords (SE) (SDE) and Amazon (SE) (SDE), and include stories from several FTWA writers. In 2012, EBP published its initial anthologies: The Fall: Tales from the Apocalypse, (available viaAmazon and Smashwords) and Spring Fevers (also available through Smashwords, andAmazon). Matt blogs at the Elephant's Bookshelf and is on Twitter @elephantguy68.

Who Do You Think You Are?

by Matt Sinclair

Can a man accurately write a story from a woman’s perspective? Can a woman write in a man’s voice? Can a 20-something Asian American who’s lived in the Northeast all his life write about being a black blues musician from the south? Can a Christian academic write about the tenets of Islam? Can a Muslim write about the politics of Jesus?

In my opinion, the answer to all these questions is yes. Of course, those answers come with at least a couple caveats: Such writers must do their research thoroughly, and they not only need to be excellent writers but also confident that they’ve approached their goal with respect.

Writing about people we are not is one of the joys of writing fiction. In its purest form, it is imagination; to be publishable, it must be informed imagination.

I recall starting a novel too soon. I had a vision of the characters, but before I’d finished my first page, I could see that my understanding was superficial. What did I know about being in my 70s or 80s and looking back on life? About as much as I knew about living and working in Antarctica, which was where part of my story would take place. It was years of research before I felt confident to start telling the tale of those characters, and I still need to do more research.

Of course, most of that research won’t make it directly on the page. Instead it comes through between the lines—in the words chosen and the attitudes conveyed.

In my opinion, it’s not merely about showing respect to the subject matter, which is critical, but it’s also about respecting the readers. We need to always remember that readers are perceptive. Tell an entertaining tale and readers might say nice things about your book, but if you expect them to suspend disbelief, to leave their real world behind for your imagined one, you need to do your homework. Of course, this might explain why so many writers’ early novels seem to be autobiographical.

But you’re writing something original, right? How would your main character react if someone cut him off on the road, or tripped her at a restaurant? These things don’t happen in your manuscript? Doesn’t matter. What I’m getting at is how well do you know your characters and how they’d react to adversity. It shouldn’t matter whether you’re a lapsed Catholic writing about a Sephardic Jewish family or a guy from suburban New Jersey writing about a girl living in rural Iowa. But the identity of the writer and the identity of the characters do matter to readers.

From the first time your manuscript crosses an agent’s desktop, it needs convey an answer to the question that will be on every reader’s mind: Who is this writer and why should I believe what is in front of me?

Who do you think you are? I hope you’re not only an author, you’re also a believable and authentic authority.

Matt Sinclair, a New York City-based journalist and fiction writer, is also president and chief elephant officer of Elephant's Bookshelf Press, which recently published Summer's Edge and Summer's Double Edge, which are available through Smashwords (SE) (SDE) and Amazon (SE) (SDE), and include stories from several FTWA writers. In 2012, EBP published its initial anthologies: The Fall: Tales from the Apocalypse, (available viaAmazon and Smashwords) and Spring Fevers (also available through Smashwords, andAmazon). Matt blogs at the Elephant's Bookshelf and is on Twitter @elephantguy68.