Is there anything as frustrating as having a partial request, or a full for that matter, form rejected by an agent or publisher? Well, if there are, brothers and sisters, I sure as Hell do not want to know about it. This business is rough and depressing enough without you lot making things worse by introducing my virgin sensibilities to the negativity I’ve been fortunate enough to avoid so far. So there! 😛

Now, truth be told, we all know just how much of a pain in the ass the above question is. It probably wouldn’t be so bad if the gatekeepers would just give us a hint as to why they didn’t want our story… or at least come right out and tell us we suck mountainous rocks. But, no. For the most part they just leave us to twist in the wind like an old plastic bag that got caught in the limbs of a dead tree.

To be fair, though, you’d have to know how busy agents and editors really are. And I’m not even going to go into how much they actually have riding on the decisions they make daily. Agents a little less so than an editor. All the agent misses out on with a bad decision is a potential commission. The editor risks their job if they make too many gaffs and start costing the publisher money.

Ok, you caught me. I did it anyway. But you can’t begin to understand why you may have gotten that form rejection without understanding what the other guy has laid on the line.

Quite honestly, almost every rejection you get will be a type of form rejection. Face it, brothers and sisters, your manuscript is one of hundreds that come in the P.O. box, or e-mail, daily. The gatekeeper’s ‘to do’ box grows at a rate that would make a politician’s bank account jealous. Odds are, unless the ‘personalized’ rejection was hand written expressly to you; it’s just a gentler form rejection that has probably been sent to quite a few other would be authors, verbatim.

Like it, or not, we’re just another faceless manuscript in an ever growing pile of manuscripts. If you have ever done a well thought out critique, then try to imagine doing that for several 100,000 plus word stories a day. Starting to see why you get a form rejection instead of a personal response that will take twenty or more minutes to write, yet?

Hell, it takes me a whole day to do a critique of one chapter for one of my crit partners. I can’t even imagine trying to do it for a whole novel with a hundred more waiting for me to get to them. And we want an agent to drop what they’re doing and give us detailed reasons for our rejections? Would you, if you had all that work to do? (For those of you who said, “Yes.”, I’m Henry the Eighth… pleased to meet you.)

So, I’m going to let you in on a big secret in the publishing industry. When you have a polished story that has been put through all the proper channels of beta reading, critique partnering, revisions and rewriting, then still get a form rejection. The most likely reason is this: The agent, or editor did not think they could sell it.

It’s actually that simple. This is a business, and if they don’t believe they can make a buck or two off the work they are going to reject it. None of the gatekeepers are in the business to give you, or me, writing lessons. That is our job, not theirs.

If you suspect it is your writing, then you need to get busy with your end of the deal and work on your art. If you do have a good story that the gatekeepers don’t think they can sell, then you have two options. Trunk the book as a non-commercial idea whose time has not yet come, or prove ‘em wrong and put it out there yourself. After all, the reading public is the only critic whose opinion is worth a damn, anyway.

If you can sell it big, I’ll personally guarantee the agents and editors will be beating a path to your door to represent your next book. As I said, this is a business, and you just proved beyond doubt that you are a saleable commodity.

Does the post seem a bit cold so far? That’s probably because this is a cold business to try and break into. It always has been, and a little research into the struggle of famous authors will prove it. But, I am not a cold person, and neither are a lot of other writers I know of. So, in that spirit, and being true to my real nature, let me offer you some help in getting where you want to go. (If your still reading this, that is.)

There is wonderful on line community of writers in all phases of the publishing experience known as AgentQuery Connect. You can find all sorts of help on every phase of this job there. I warn you though, it is an addictive place to be.

Another fantastic on line resource for writers is WritetoDone. I would also highly suggest downloading their free EBook, The (nearly) Ultimate Guide to Better Writing. The link for it is on every page there, so you won’t have any trouble finding it.

Ok, so much for the free resources that can help you cut your odds of being rejected. Time to see just how serious you are about becoming a published writer. How bad do you want it, and how much are you willing to invest in yourself, and your craft? I’m not talking a fortune here, but if you are unwilling to spend a little on yourself and your craft, then I have to question just how badly you really do want to be a writer.

There are two books from The Writer’s Digest that are really helpful. Bargain hunters can probably find them cheaper on Amazon, but however you get a hold of them, by all means, stop being so cheap and get them. They are:

No More Rejections: (50 Secrets To Writing A Manuscript That Sells), by Alice Orr

and

Writing the Popular Novel, by Loren D. Estleman

Google both titles, or follow the above link to The Writer’s Digest, and acquire them both. At the worst you’ll spend about $45.00 on yourself and your craft. Surely you’re worth $45.00? Well I think you are, and you’ll be very happy if you think so, too. (C’mon, be honest. You spent at least that much in one month on entertainment that didn’t do a thing for your career.)

Best of luck, and…

later, Gang! 😉

Nope. Sorry to disappoint, but this little post is not about the hazards of addiction, or alcoholism in the writing profession. Well maybe one addiction, but we’ll get to that in a moment. As far as alcoholism goes; I take the fifth. Maybe the pint, but that’s another story. 😉

This post is about the most insidious addiction any aspiring author can face: The desire to get published. Like all addictions this one has more hidden traps than a politician has lies. If we’re not careful it can also land you in a hole that Betty Ford can’t dig you out of.

Besides our love of storytelling, and much like a drug, there are few things that will give a writer a bigger high than when the muse is pouring out full force. Hence the first half of the title. When we are hitting the groove, and the well of clever creativity seems bottomless, that’s when the addiction to publish rears its ugly head. We become as desperate as a heroin junky to have our baby shown to the world. If Satan showed up at that moment with a contract in hand, we would jump at the chance, or at least seriously consider it. The problem is he often does, but doesn’t look like himself so we’ll be more likely to take the bait.

By now, most of us know about the land sharks that swim through the business of writing. If not, then I suggest bookmarking two sites that can help the newbie to identify these publishing leeches. One of the best is Predators and Editors. The other is, Writer Beware by the SFWA.

However, these are not the only forms the publishing addiction devil can take. One of the worst, and most devious is when he takes the form of YOU. When Louis Binstock first said, “Very often we are our own worst enemy…”, he wasn’t lying, and that little cliche deserves a place carved in gold.

A true story, and I’m not naming names because this can happen to anyone and I don’t want to embarrass, only illustrate. A very talented writer I know recently epublished a very good novel. Thinking that they had exhausted their list of agents, and none of them were interested they decided to go to the readers with their book. Normally this is a very good tactic these days. You have to work your tailbone off to get some recognition, but your story has a chance of gaining a audience and you have a chance to gain a career. All in all it is a smart move. Unless, as in their case, an agent you forgot about suddenly pops up asking for a look at the manuscript.

Yep, that is just what happened, and my heart goes out to them. Most agents won’t touch a story once it has been epublished, and neither will most publishing houses. The possible exception being a story that is raking in the bucks. Even then, they would be likely to offer publishing your next book instead of going with the epublished one. In a way it’s not really fair, since you did all the work gaining a readership, and now they want a piece of your pie, but that’s the way it plays out most of the time.

Let’s face it; epublishing and POD (Print On Demand) publishing is something of a godsend to a struggling author. But, if you allow the addiction of getting published to drive you like a mule team, it can also be your worst enemy.

Another way this “golden goose” can trip you up is by turning out bad writing. As hard as it is to live down a bad reputation in the real world, it can be a thousand times worse here in cyberspace. Especially if that rep goes viral. At that point your probably better off turning to a pen name and starting all over again from scratch.

This is why an editor or, a whole trailer truck of beta readers, is so important in serious epublishing. Even then there are no guarantees, but at least your not putting the noose on yourself, and jumping off the gallows on your own.

The point to all this drivel? Haste does indeed make waste. Being in a rush to publish is usually a suicide charge into a machine gun nest. If your very lucky, you might only get wounded, odds are your gonna get cut in half.

This is a slow business, no matter how you approach it. Take your time, get it right, and most of all do not jump at the chance to get published in any form. You have all the time that is left to you. Make it work for you, instead of against you, and keep that addiction locked up tight in a little cell somewhere.

In the end, you may just be glad you did.

Later, Gang.

Keeping up with the changes to the world of writing over the past couple of decades or so, seems daunting enough. Between Print On Demand technologies, Epublishing, Kindle, Mobi, Barnes&Noble getting in on the ebook reader bandwagon, as well as the ever shrinking advances and support from the traditional publishing houses; it can feel more than a bit overwhelming for the aspiring author. Particularly if you happen to be completely new to the business.

To make matters worse, if you do decide to go the self-publishing route you will discover that everything is left in your hands. This means that you are responsible for Graphics, (your cover art); Typesetting, (the look of your book), Proofreading (finding all those niggeling little gaffs that people will point to and say, “What a dumbass.”); Editing, (I don’t really have to explain this one, do I?); Marketing, (Advertising, promoting, etc.); and Formatting, (making certain your ‘baby’ looks just as good in Kindle as it does in Mobi, etc.).

Unless you happen to have major bank to hire a pro to do these jobs for you, you are stuck with Do It Yourself, (DYI). The problem here is, not all of us are Graphic artists, Salesmen, or typesetters. (Plus one points if you know what kerning is. If you have to look it up, then you know what I’m rambling on about.)

Now, I don’t know about you, but I don’t have a big bankroll to spend on any of these necessary endeavors. To be honest, with my medical bills I’m doing well to ensure we get to eat something besides soup beans once a month around the old homestead. That fact alone leaves me in pretty much the same situation as most of you out there.

And lets face it, most of us are not computer programmers. So formatting in different reader languages holds the same frustration as trying to write a gaming program in C++, Pascal, Cobal, and Assembly simultaneously. Which doesn’t take into consideration that most programs are notoriously stubborn about reading another programs files. In fact they’re downright prejudiced about it. One of the reasons that webpages view differently between browsers.

But, take heart. Although this all seems to be akin to climbing Mount Everest with nothing more than a bag of rosin and a pair of tennis shoes for equipment, there is much we can learn to make the task easier. We might not be able to do every one of those tasks that go into publishing a book, but what we can do will go a long way towards “rolling our own.”

For this round let’s focus on formatting. Since most of us are trying to make a living as writers, we need to build as large a readership as we possibly can within our chosen genres. This means that we can not rely on Amazon, or Smashwords to do the job for us. Well, we can with Smashwords, to an extent. But that seems akin to allowing someone else to breathe for us. It might work, but it probably won’t work as well as breathing for ourselves.

Unless you are proficient in HTML, XML, or Mobi, you’re going to have to find a way to accomplish this task for ourselves. As you probably guessed, this means a couple of programs to do the job for us, and a way to check our results.

First off you will need at least two separate ebook reading programs, one for Kindle and one for Mobi, (Barns& Noble use the Mobi format). The Kindle reader program is free for your PC, and can be found here from Amazon. Mobi format reader for PC can also be downloaded for free here. And if you want to make certain that you have as many possible versions to cover as many bases as you can, here is where you can find out about The Top 4 Free ePub Readers for PC.

Ok. Now that we have a way to actually see what our ebook will look like in pretty much all the top ebook readers, it’s time to get down to some serious DYI formatting.

The easiest way to get this part of the job done also involves two free programs. One is Sigil, a What You See Is What You Get, (WYSIWYG), ebook editor; the other is Calibre, an ebook manager capable of doing a pretty good job of changing an ebook’s format without messing up the book’s look… most of the time. To fix any problems you may have in this, and other areas of useing these two programs to format your own ebooks for self-publishing, here are some links to a few tutorials that can help you over those rough spots:

IT Connect/Creating ePUB Ebooks.

How To Easily Write and Publish Ebooks with Sigil.

Getting Started with Calibre.

Now, before you get to thinking this is easy, don’t. It is easier than learning HTML, or Mobi coding language, but your still going to have to do some serious work. The upside is, you will know for certain how your book is going to look to the reader. The more proficient you become in using these programs, the more professional your ebook will look.

Good luck, and I hope this makes it easier for you to get the results you want.

Ever;
Pete

I’ve not spoken much about my standing in the Speculative Fiction Marathon, and there is good reason for it. Thus far I have either been very good, or very lucky. In the reviews of the first three chapters I have received only one ‘No’ vote. I didn’t address the issue because it would feel like bragging to me. I hate bragging, especially from myself. Bragging seems like an open opportunity to stick your foot in your mouth, and I haven’t sucked my toes since I was about 14 months old. At least, not if I could help it.

So, why bring it up now? Simply because it appears that I will be re-writing and re-posting chapter four. The vote stands at two ‘Yes’, and two ‘No.’ (See? If I had been crowing about my ‘stellar record’, I’d be dining on that same crow right about now.)

But, I digress. This offers me a perfect opportunity to muse about re-writing, plot holes, and editing in general. It also allows me to muse about these bumps in the road leading to published author, and the aspiring writer’s near phobic aversion to them.

If you are really serious about making a career as a writer, that’s all they are. Bumps in the road. If small things like this are major disasters for you, my sympathies when the really big things hit. You’re gonna get splattered across the literary landscape like semi-truck roadkill.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I am definitely NOT saying that you have to roll over for every little nit that someone discovers in your manuscript. What I am saying is there will be things that you didn’t think of, and to let them go unaddressed simply because the reviewer, critic, or editor doesn’t see your ‘genius’ is just plain s-t-u-p-i-d. 99.99% of the time, you are passing up an opportunity to turn out something of a masterpiece for the sake of your ego.

I don’t know about anyone else, but my ego isn’t the one paying the bills, or trying to get this career off the ground. I am.

Wait a minute! Isn’t my ego the same thing as me? No. My ego is that very small part of me that has a bad habit of getting in the way and screwing up a good thing. Robert L. Ringer, in his seminal classic “Looking Out For Number One”, compared ego to a dinosaur. As long as you feed it, everything is fine. The moment you reach a point where you can’t feed it; it will step on your house.

I’m sorry to say that over the years I have tested this little theory of Robert’s. Know what? There are a few crushed houses in my wake that used to belong to me. Relationships where I just had to be right, jobs where I knew better than the boss, small businesses where I was the Boss and knew better than anyone else. Sometimes I wonder where I would be right now if I hadn’t let ego get in my way.

Think I’m going to let that little S.O.B get in my way this time? Oh, Hell no! If this is going to fail, I can do bad all by myself, thank you.

The point to all this meandering? Mostly it’s been to remind myself what letting my ego get in the way has cost me in the past. But, also to let any other, younger writers know what they have in store for them by letting their own dinosaur run unchecked.

One of the trickiest areas to deal with is knowing when something is a legitimate point, and when it actually is a story destroying opinion. Most things are not. They are simply something you didn’t notice, or a way of handling something that you didn’t think of. I’ll let you in on a little secret, too.

Even the best actor you can think of has a director telling them what to do. It’s the same in the publishing world. Editors, beta readers, agents, and critics are all doing the job of the director. Actors who puff up their ego, no matter how famous, soon find themselves without work. The actors who work with the director find themselves in demand, and very often on the cover of Entertainment Weekly. The same rule holds true for authors… in particular aspiring authors.

For myself, I’ll be re-writing chapter four, regardless. To be truthful about it, I’ll be re-writing the other three chapters as well. Even though they passed, there were many points made that I needed, and I’m sure going to use them. So, in the end it doesn’t really matter if I pass this week, or not. The only difference will be, if I don’t, the rest of the group will get to see the re-write before the story is finished. 😉 😀

But, before anyone thinks I’m totally wishy-washy; I will be keeping the term knight. There is ample evidence that the term could have originated with the Celts, as well as the practice of dubbing.

In The Epics of Celtic Ireland, by Jean Markale, (Which analyses the few surviving written accounts of Celtic mythology.) The Celtic God Mananann Mac Lir was often called the Knight of the Sea, and was referred to in the translations this way. Since the Celts did have a word for King, the word used to describe his title is obviously something else, and this word was translated as knight.

See? You don’t have to give up everything. 😉

Ever;
Pete

Working through the AQC Speculative Fiction Marathon is an experience in itself. As a result some things have gotten away from me. The blog, for example. It’s probably not a good idea to let it lay fallow for such a long time. Assuming I still have any readers out there, I’ll try not to do so again.

Jumping back into the blogging fray, it occurred to me that one has to have an extreme degree of toughness to consider becoming a writer. Either that, or just enjoy the sensation of pain. It’s a small wonder that Leopold von Sacher-Masoch was an Austrian writer and journalist. The namesake of masochism couldn’t have chosen a better profession to feed his need. (Short of volunteering to be a human target for a knife throwing class, that is.)

All that said, I will say that I am not a friend of pain. The less I experience that sensation in any of its myriad forms the better. But, like death and taxes, it is impossible to avoid completely. In particular when it stands between you and something you want. Such as becoming a published author, for instance.

When I have often heard a non-writer, and on occasion an aspiring writer, comment on what an easy job writing is; I come to two conclusions. One being that they have never tried to seriously become an author. The other is, they need to stop eating those wild mushrooms before they loose all sense of reality, or accidentally kill themselves.

The truth is, the moment you decide to pursue the career you have set yourself up for more work, and abuse, than you could possibly imagine. Not only is your ‘finished novel’ nowhere near as finished as you think, but the task of polishing your baby into publishing quality is one long hard road to travel. Until the book actually sees print you will be rewriting, revising, and rethinking every nuance in it. In short both your baby, and your ego is in for one hell of a beating.

Don’t think for a moment that self-publishing will save your tail, either. Not if your serious. In many ways self-publishing is harder than traditional publishing. Especially if you ignore any well meaning advise you may receive on your work. Since you won’t have the aid of a seasoned editor to help you, you’ll have to take the advice of your beta readers and peers. Ignore that, and I guarantee your reviews are going to chew you a new one. If you are lucky enough to get a review in the first place.

Even better, none of this so far takes into account the massive amount of work you will have to put into marketing your book, promoting your book, and advertising your book. Then, when all that is said and done, it is still quite possible that you’ve done little more than waste your time, effort, and money. The book can still fail simply because the reading public doesn’t want it.

As I said on AQC recently, (A phrase Darke liked so much she tweeted it.): The publishing business is a dog eat dog world, and we are all wearing Milkbone underwear.

Now, I do have to say that it is not my intention to scare anyone away from a career in writing. Instead I’m just trying to give a heads up. This job isn’t the sweet, work-less deal that many take it for. It is hard and brutal. To have a chance of success you have to be tough. You must be willing to wade through Hell just to sandpaper a wildcat’s ass in a phone booth.

It all boils down to one thing. How bad do you want it?

For myself, hand me a sheet of #6 grit, and close the door on the phone booth. 😉

Ever;
Pete

As it becomes harder for an aspiring author to break into traditional publishing, more are opting for self-publishing. Continuing from the last post, it should be obvious for the serious writer that self-publishing isn’t as easy as it first seems. Oh, sure anyone can do it, but it’s not just a case of putting your work out there, and sitting on your ass waiting for the bucks to roll in. That approach is a lot like trying to mow the lawn while your watching HBO on the boob tube. It just isn’t going to get the job done.

Even in today’s traditional publishing world the burden of getting your sales up is shifting to the author. Sure, you get a smaller up front advance, (which is based on how well the publisher thinks the book will sell), but most of the promoting and marketing is going to fall square in the author’s lap. The big advantage is that you will have access to a good editor, and limited access to a public relations department. Both assets are well worth the contract, but if you want your readership to grow, it’s still going to be your responsibility.

We’ve already looked at the value of beta readers, and critiques. Particularly so when they happen to be fellow writers. So, lets concentrate on the bane of any writer’s life. Editing. Before you make a mad rush for the exit, please remember that if you want a chance at succeeding in this business your going to have to do it anyway. Editing is as inescapable as death. To paraphrase the immortal Mae West, “When rape, (editing), is inevitable, you might as well relax and enjoy it.” 😉

One of my favorite self-editing tricks that may, or may not, help you is what I like to call the ‘different format’ trick. Basically, what this entails is changing what your manuscript looks like, without changing the original. Two things that will come in real handy here are the ‘save as’ command, and a PDF maker. If you don’t have a PDF creator, never fear. There is a good free one for download at SourceForge. It will allow you to create a PDF from any Windows program. You use it like a printer in Word, Excel or any other Windows application.

Once you have your PDF creator, ‘select all’ in your manuscript, change your line spacing, font style, or anything else that will make the document different than the one your bloodshot eyes have been fussing over. Then, and this is the most important part, ‘save as’ anything other than your manuscript’s name. I usually name mine test, or edit. This will save a new document, and leave the original untouched.

Lastly, create your PDF from the new manuscript, and start reading. You’ll be surprised at the number of mistakes that will suddenly stand out to you. At least it does in my case. The reason why is; you have just tricked your brain into seeing the document as something unfamiliar. Since it is no longer totally familiar to you, many editing mistakes stand out more. It makes it easier to put yourself in the place of a reader of the story instead of the writer.

I have to say here that the above method is particularly effective when coupled with the ‘let it rest’ technique. Get away from your story for a week, or two. Don’t think about it. Work on something else, then go back and do the above. I think you’ll be surprised by the results.

While I’m gearing these posts more towards the growing self-publishing industry, I’m certain you can see the advantage of doing this for any manuscript, query, or *shudder* synopsis. Besides, if you do happen to land an agent, and a publisher, never fear… they are going to make you edit it all over again, anyway. 😉

Now, I can’t say for sure that this method will work for everyone. All I can honestly say is, “It works for me.” If it can help you by making your own self-editing life a little easier, I’m glad I could help. If not, please feel free to put it all down as the diseased ramblings of a professed lunatic and ignore it.:D

Ever;
Pete

When I was studying stage magic there was an observation that most of the best writers on the subject made. Magic tricks are separated into two general categories: Easy hard tricks, and hard easy tricks. What this means in explanation is; there are illusions that appear to the audience to be very hard to pull off, yet are so easy you could teach a chimpanzee to do them in about a half hour. There are also illusions that look easy to the audience which actually take months to master, if not years.

A nice bit of trivia, but what does this have to do with storytelling and writing? Quite a bit. Especially in today’s convoluted landscape of opportunity.

When I first attempted to make a career as a storyteller the opportunities were rather limited. An author attempting to enter the speculative fiction market was pretty much limited to short stories in magazines, or novels. The last assuming that you could land an agent and sell something to a publisher. Considering the immense number of potential authors out there, neither option was an easy break. Just as they are today.

Self-publishing was an option, but for the most part the vanity press, as it was known, was a dead end fraud. The vanity press made good money off of want-to-be authors who had a bit of cash to spend, but the author still remained an unknown. They also found themselves stuck with a few hundred unsalable books.

Then the digital revolution and e-books struck. Today anyone, and I do mean anyone, can publish a story; either electronically, or as a print on demand physical book. The cost, if any, is miniscule at best and well within the reach of nearly any aspiring author. But, just as with the easy hard tricks of the stage magician, it really isn’t as easy as it looks. This is particularly true if you are serious about being a author.

One of the down sides of the e-book revolution is that there is a lot of delusional crap flooding the market. This is brought about by the aspiring author who believes that they can write as well as anyone else, and after a series of failures they turn to e-publishing. Never mind that they rarely check their spelling, or that they never bothered to have anyone beyond their family and good friends read their ‘work’. They are a good wrighter an they knows it. Them other poeples just don’t have no taste. (See what I mean?)

The ‘writing is easy’ crowd aside, at first blush the e-book market does look like an easy alternative to traditional publishing for the aspiring professional. In truth, it is not. In fact it is actually the harder market when you consider what it will take for the serious author to garner a readership.

First, and foremost, you will lack the services of a good editor. Unless you have a few thousand dollars laying about, you are on your own in this particular spectrum of the writing business. Even if you do have the extra cash to spend for one, it’s still no guarantee anyone is going to notice you. The odds are; you just blew a couple of thousand bucks for a return of thirty, or forty bucks and about as many readers. No matter how you tally that, it isn’t a wise investment.

This means you are going to have to find a way to be your own editor. The problem there is you are too damn close to your own story. You are going to miss things like pacing, story flow, plot holes, and clumsy sentences that you thought were aerial lines of prose. Trust me, no matter how good you think you are, they weren’t.

One of the best remedies for this is to garner a few beta readers. Preferably other writers who are working for the same goal you are. Most writers are avid readers, and they will notice the things that you missed. A harder method is to enable yourself to look at your own work as if someone else wrote it. This is near to impossible for most aspiring authors. It requires a discipline that most of us lack. It also doesn’t take into consideration the fact that human beings are notorious for our ability to lie to ourselves.

But, if you are one of the few who is serious about your craft, then I do have good news for you. There is a way to develop those all important beta readers, and critiques. Join a writer’s critique group where you can make friends in the industry. AgentQuery Connect is one, Critters Writers Workshop is another. Although there are hundreds more on the web, these are the two best.

Oh, and before you get the wrong idea, allow me to give you one piece of advice. Neither of the two I have mentioned is a quick fix. Your going to have to put forth some effort. To gain a friend, you have to be a friend. So, don’t just run in and immediately start looking for people to help you out. That approach is both rude, and self-serving. You’ll be spotted in a moment.

Offer to help others out first. Make friends. Be a friend. Be ready to accept criticism, and take advice. Not all of it will fit you, but it’s better than trying to go it alone.

Since most of what I’m musing about here can’t be done in a single blog post, I’ll let things go and continue with the other aspects the ‘easy hard way’ will throw at you in future posts.

Perhaps between all of us we can find a better method for the serious author to get their work noticed. At the least, we can try. 😉

Ever;
Pete

There is probably no greater temptation for the aspiring author than that of the wild cliché. That is with the exception of selling your soul to the Devil for a best seller, of course. The plain fact is, clichés are just too easy to use. You know that nearly everyone, and their uncle, reading the darn thing is going to get the point. And let’s face it, our lives are simply riddled with clichés. We can’t seem to live without them.

Clichés also seem to breed like cockroaches under a damp sink. Every time you turn around there’s another one taking its first steps into the collective consciousness. On the internet they are called memes, in business they are called catch phrases, in linguistics they are known as slang. But, make no mistake, all of them will grow up to become full fledged clichés sooner, or later. Words and phrases that were at one time popular are now looked at like something the cat dragged in.

Even presidents have used clichés. My fellow Americans can remember more politicians than you can shake a stick at asking, “Where’s the beef?”. Not to mention, the examples of presidential speech writers using clichés would fill several blogs. But, let an aspiring author use just one in a query letter, or a manuscript, an it’s Katy bar the door. Agents, and editors will drop you like a hot potato. They despise clichés with a passion.

I don’t care how many clichés you find in a published author’s novel, do it while your trying to get your foot in the door, and your ass is grass. Of course, when we look at all the rule breaking that seems to get by in the publishing world, it’s hard not to think that you can’t win for losing.

But, I am a sneaky cuss, so let’s put our heads together and see if we can’t come up with a solution. Let’s see if we can sneak in the back door, and tame the wild cliché.

There is the slick-it-by method, but you really have to toe the line to make this one work. In this method you are taking a gamble and putting all your cards on the table. Let one, or two clichés pass as is. The idea here is to teach an old dog a new trick. You carefully choose a cliché that’s old as the hills, one that hasn’t been used in ages, but is still young enough to be remembered with nostalgia instead of nausea. After all, agents and editors are human, too. A cliché that can invoke a bit of nostalgia can have the same effect on them, and they let it pass. After all, you only did it once. Who knows, you might just get away with murder here.

The second method of taming the wild cliché is the fix-it-later technique. While effective, you have to watch this one like a hawk. I have good news and bad news about this method. The good news first; it will not interrupt the flow of your writing. When you decide to use a cliché, you just go right ahead and use it. Don’t worry about it. The bad news is that you have to go back through your story and reword all those clichés you just used. Every single one must be reworded so that you say the same thing but it doesn’t look like you used a cliché.

Since there is no risk of actually using a cliché in the second method, unless you accidentally leave one in, the agents and editors will be none the wiser and you get to use all the clichés you want. Just make sure you have an eagle eye and reword those suckers before you send your masterpiece off.

Sneaky, huh?

Now, incase you haven’t noticed, this post is up to its eyeballs in clichés. I had to shut the cliché finder off on WordPress just so I could write the thing. To any agents, or editors out there who notice all the god awful clichés that I riddled this article with: I can assure you it was deliberate, and I don’t normally write this way. Cross my heart and hope to die.

Clichés are a subject we have discussed many times at AgentQuery Connect, and I’m sure we will discuss them many more times. To use them, or not. Are they effective, or not. But, what the hell. When it comes to getting published, we’re all just squirrels trying to get a nut.

Ever;
Pete