David Louis Edelman, author of Infoquake, rips aside the veil of secrecy to reveal the Five Things That Don't Happen When You Become a Published Author.
He could have added more; I don't see "heavens open up to sing hosannahs to the new author" and "dancing girls follow you everywhere" on that list...
Update, 3/19 @ 11:58: Edelman has now added the Five Things That Do Happen When You Become a Published Author. Still no dancing girls, I'm sad to say...
Paolo Bacigalupi is reading a SF novel -- which he is very careful not to name -- and finding that it has a lot of SFnal background details that don't actually add anything to the story. He's coined the term "futurizing" for this effect, and mulls the question over a bit.
It's an interesting question -- I've seen readers reject stories as "not SF" due to the lack of "futurizing," and there's definitely a deep strain in the field that wants and loves those intricately-thought-out, eyeball-kick future details. But if they don't have anything important to do with that particular story, do they belong?
To be honest, they're really AOL's ficlets, but Scalzi is the guy out front talking about them the most where I can notice it.
And what is a "ficlet," you ask? It's a collaborative short fiction site. (But not a desert topping.) So anyone in the world can go and fiddle around with somebody else's story (or vice versa) for hours on end.
Doesn't sound like fun to me, but if we all liked the same things, imagine the pudding shortage!
LiveJournal has brought forth The "Life Is Too Grim Already" League, to promote the writing and reading of speculative fiction which does not cause one to slit one's wrists.
I am entirely in sympathy with their aims, and I hope they're successful. There's a lot of dreariness in SF these days -- I mumbled about that on my personal blog the other week, which may have been one of the things that sparked this League -- and I hope it can be at least kept from spreading.
The LITGA League joins the New Comprehensible and the New Space Princess Movement as the SF world's brand-new manifestos, and, if they actually lead to anything, this may be a very good year.
At SFF World, Andrew Smith details exactly how to write a derivative fantasy novel. (It's not as funny as The Tough Guide to Fantasyland, I'm afraid.)
The Odyssey Workshop has a podcast of a lecture from mid-2006 by Jeff VanderMeer.
John C. Wright is a thoughtful writer, and one not afraid to share his opinions. Yesterday he wrote about the factors that make a piece of writing Good SF, and asserted that conventional measures of literary quality (characterization, plot: all that stuff) don't matter.
You know, I just managed to club the zombie Hugo Gernsback back into his grave, and now Wright has to go digging him up again...
David Louis Edelman explains, in two detailed parts, how he got published.
Jennifer Fallon provides a cheat sheet of how fast one's characters can travel 100 miles, given different kinds of transportation. (She does omit the perennially popular "flying Eagles into Mordor," though.)
Kelly McCullough, at Wyrdsmiths, explains all of the reasons one might want to (or need to) use a pen name.
There's a new SFF blogger in town, with an identity shrouded in secrecy. The blogger at Velcro City Tourist Board (himself pseudononymous, though I think not secret) has discovered this new blogger, and wonders who it might be.
The new blog is under the name Writing and Self-Publishing Tips, and the blogger doesn't seem to even have a pseudonym. So -- who could this be?
Well, it's not National Talk Like a Pirate Day anymore, but pirates are still proliferating in the SF world.
John Joseph Adams e-mailed me yesterday to let me know that he's guest-editing a special "pirate issue" of Shimmer, and that submissions for that open today (December 1st).
And my former WFC shipmate Jeff VanderMeer is also co-editing a pirate-themed anthology for Night Shade Books (with that noted scoundrel of the seas Ann VanderMeer), for which submissions are still open.
So if anyone out there has a pirate story that's languishing, unpublished -- aarrr! Haul it out, me hearty!
I always like reading what Justine Larbalestier writes. (First person)
You would be well served to read her blog, which is full of useful, interesting posts. (Second person)
Yesterday, she explained all about different types of narration. (Third person)
Jeffrey Carver, author of the recent Battlestar Galactica novelization, answers the common reader question: how do you get the job to write a tie-in novel?
(Short answer: be known already for writing non tie-in novels. A reputation for being fast helps quite a lot, too. A reputation for being good would be even better.)
[via SF Signal]
Wired magazine asked a pile of mostly SFnal people to write six word stories. (Inspired by the famous taunt of F. Scott Fitzgerald to Ernest Hemingway that the latter couldn't write a story at that length. Papa, of course, replies: "For Sale: baby shoes, never worn.")
The results are all posted over at Wired's site, and I know I've seen other people trying to play the game as well. (The one I can remember specifically, and find, is from the Usenet group rec.arts.sf.written, which descended very quickly into author-bashing.)
For myself? Well, I'm not a writer, but how about:
Secrets not meant for man? Pshaw!
This will be of interest only to those of you who are (or want to be) professional writers, or those who are incurably curious:
Deanna Hoak has posted one of her periodic essays to demistify the world of copyediting, and this time she tackles the mysteries of copyeditor's marks. A couple of these are things that I keep forgetting about (since I don't see them often enough to remember), so I'm sure they'll be completely new to many of you.
Possibly in honor of the recent publication of Jim Theis's immortal epic The Eye of Argon, Meme Therapy recently ran a contest for purple prose.
The winners are now in, and they're...well, quite something.
On Spec magazine presents the workshop that aspiring writers really need: how not to write. If you ever wanted to know the things to avoid in your writing (and you happen to be close to Edmonton), this workshop may be for you.
[via SF Signal]
Jennfer Fallon must be feeling morbid today, because she's just posted a list of acceptable ways to kill people in fiction.
I think she's missed the James Bond standard "leave the hero tied up in a deathtrap," though many deathtraps would fall under her existing categories. Still, I love taxonomies, and I'dd like to see someone try toi use every single one of these in one story.
Robert Silverberg has a marvelous essay in Asimov's, about the changes that technology have made on writing since he started.
[via SF Signal]
The first annual R.L. Fanthorpe Write-Alike Contest is now open; the deadline for entries is October 10th.
The judges await your entry, submission, attempt, participation...
[via Locus Online]
Jennifer Fallon has some writing advice today -- that all characters need to be flawed.
For those of you working up an argument in your minds, remember that we have a name for the utterly perfect protagonist, and it's an ugly one: the Mary Sue.
Well, I guess my headline said it all already, didn't it? John Jarrold blogs about some DOs and DON'Ts that aspiring writers should know.
(One he didn't mention, because it's obvious: write good. If you don't do that, everything else is pointless.)
Margo Lanagan has a list of words that she tells her writing students never to use in a story. Well, Justine Larbalestier loves every single one of those words, and wants to not only use them a lot herself, but encourages everyone to use them.
Who! Will! Win!
Lou Anders, editor of Pyr, has codified the unwritten laws of editing. And, because he's a science fiction editor, not only are there precisely three of them, but the third actually includes "in so far as doing so does not conflict with the First or Second Law."
Just wait: someone will come along and propose the Zeroth law of editing. And then someone else will attempt to create editors who are not bound by the laws...
The legendary Clarion writers' workshop (originally of Clarion, Pennsylvania, then on the frozen Michigan tundra since 1972) is moving to sunny San Diego as of 2007. Information on the new location, as well as applications, links to the Clarion eBay auction, and everything else related to your Clarion needs is on their website.
Does this mean we'll have to start talking about Clarion North and South? (Although "Clarion South" is already in use for the Australian version, which makes things more complicated.)
I thought I was done with this idea, but how could I resist when Tobias runs through his whole routine -- including pictures! -- for writing a novel?
Warning! Some of these processes and comments may be contradictory. The SFBC can not be held responsible for would-be writers trying to follow several processes simultaneously. On the other hand, if you can't find one of these processes that work for you, perhaps the thing to do is reconsider one's career as a novelist.
In related news, SF author and writing instructor Crawford Killian (also the author of an excellent how-to-write book which the SFBC sold for years, and the cover of which I can picture, though its title is lost in the mists of memory) has set up an extensive website called Write a Novel. Go on: guess what it's about.