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kd;alfjads;lfjkdsa;f THIS IS THE BEST THING I’VE EVER ACCIDENTALLY READ AT 6:30 IN THE MORNING

Guide to Writing and Publishing a Book

Have you always wanted to publish a book, but don’t know how? That okay! I created a step-by-step guide that can help you put your story down on paper and get it out in the world.

On my blog, I now have a Starter Kit for writing your first novel. I’ll take you through the following steps to help you with publishing your book:

Writing Your Book:

Planning

Manuscript Format

Writing

Word Count

Editing and Revision

Beta Readers

Feedback

What Next?

Choosing a Path

Traditional Publishing:

The Search for a Literary Agent

Can I Query Agents Outside My Country?

The Query Letter

The Synopsis

Send and Wait

I Have an Offer From an agent!

I Never Got an Offer!

I Have an Agent!

Publishers

Self-Publishing

Cover Design

Let’s Make an eBook

Where to Publish & Sell

My Book Got Popular, Can I Switch to Traditional?

Both:

Marketing and Publicity

Can Teenagers Publish Books?

I’m Worried About Plagiarism!

Warning: Bad Agents, Editors, and Publishers

STARTER KIT

#write

kaylapocalypse-deactivated20201

How to Write Women of Color and Men of Color if you are White.

A colleague of mine was talking to me recently about her misgivings about her capabilities regarding writing Women of Color. She wanted very badly to include several WOC characters in her sci-fantasy series, but she had some concerns about correct portrayal and writing them in a way that wouldn’t instantly piss people off. I told her I would write something about it that might help. So, here we have it: How to write POC without pissing everyone off and doing a horrible job.

kaylapocalypse-deactivated20201

In general, it comes down to three things. Research, Persistence and Consideration. Also. for the point of this essay, I am going to use Black women, Native Women and Mixed Race women as they each represent different individual (yet very important) racial struggles that need consideration.

1. Research is by far the most important thing. EVER. For this example, I am going to use Black women.

It is important to start by trying your hardest to forget anything you think you know about Black women and Black female identity. As a white person, anything you would know about them you probably learned from media that is not controlled by or monitored by black women themselves. Meaning that it is likely not a good representation of black women at all. Or maybe you just have a Black friend.

Which you should consider in the same way you would a control group for a science experiment.

One or two subjects would not provide conclusive evidence in regards to any hypothesis. Having one or two or even five black friends can’t help you with understanding the complex history of black discourse….

In order to start from scratch, I would first spend some time reading literature written by Black women for Black women. Learning the way Black women have discourse among each other is the first step to understanding their perspective AND emulating their voice. Literature is the genre of media where POC have the most liberty (unlike film) to discuss certain topics or parts of their identity.

Then, I would delve into “complaints”. There are thousands upon thousands of articles where Black women complain about their portrayal in media. These complaints are both valid and often eloquently expressed. It is important for you to know, what things Black women (WOC) are already so fucking tired of seeing in regards to incorrect or offensive portrayals of themselves. Not only will it help you avoid making the same mistakes as white writers before you (an example of this: Arthur Golden and the hot mess that is Memoirs of a Geisha), But it will also get you upset about certain ways Black women (POC women in general) are portrayed, and make you want to write them better. This can improve your writing in that not only will you avoid being offensive, but you now have the chance to be progressive and kick stereotypes out the window!

Finally, I would take some time to follow some tumblr blogs that are run by the group you’re trying to write. This part of the research can really help because you’ll get a first hand, contemporary dialogue about issues within the specific POC community. Which leads me to my second topic…

#write

createandnarrate

Science fiction and fantasy are genres where almost anything can happen — as long as the author can make it seem plausible, and as long as it's part of a good story. But that doesn't mean there are no rules. If anything, the fact that these genres are so wide open mean that there are tons of rules out there, some unspoken and some written in black and white.

In honor of today, here are 10 Writing “Rules” We Wish More Science Fiction and Fantasy Authors Would Break.

Everyone and their sister has lists upon lists of “writing rules.” Rules like ‘never ever do this. Avoid that. Do it this way, not that way’. But there are almost always exceptions if you write well enough. You know what your story needs more than anyone else. If your story needs a prologue, write a prologue. It’s always a good idea to heed the advice of experienced writers, but you don’t have to take “writing rules” as an absolute. Here are several examples pertaining to all you sci-fi and fantasy writers.

May the 4th be with you.

#write

aam5ever

Write a story with one of these words:

Luminescent Occupied Limerence Coincidence Irregular Hacking Squealing Orderly Unyielding Pressure Rhythmic Persistent Thermal Confidence Haunted Whirlwind Quotient Demand Gritty Unsavory Zero Metaphorically Draping Forsaken

#write

the-writers-society-deactivated

10 Ways to Start Your Story

In writing, as in dating and business, initial reactions matter. You don’t get a second chance, as mouthwash commercials often remind us, to make a first impression.

So it’s unfortunate that opening sentences frequently receive short shrift in writing workshops. While drilling aspiring literati on the subtleties of characterization and plot, few, if any, writing instructors offer lessons on crafting a first line, or even an introductory paragraph—though many agents and editors, if not impressed after a sentence or two, will read no further. I started devoting an entire session of my writing class to opening lines when I realized that the last formal instruction I’d had on the subject was the grade school admonition that stories should begin with “a hook.” In the years since, I’ve come to believe that the fate of most literary endeavors is sealed within the initial paragraph—and that the seeds of that triumph or defeat are usually sown by the end of the very first sentence.

Think of every opening line you write as a pebble tossed down a mountainside: The stone may jolt back and forth within a limited path, building up force, but the trajectory of its initial release largely determines its subsequent route. Never forget that the entire course of a story or novel, like an avalanche, is largely defined within its first seconds. To craft a compelling story, you must first launch it in the right direction.

Here are 10 ways to do it.

1. Build momentum. The first cardinal rule of opening lines is that they should possess most of the individual craft elements that make up the story as a whole. An opening line should have a distinctive voice, a point of view, a rudimentary plot and some hint of characterization. By the end of the first paragraph, we should also know the setting and conflict, unless there is a particular reason to withhold this information.

This need not lead to elaborate or complex openings. Simplicity will suffice. For example, the opening sentence of Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” tells the reader: “The grandmother didn’t want to go to Florida.” Already, we have a distinctive voice—somewhat distant, possibly ironic—referring to the grandmother with a definite article. We have a basic plot: conflict over a journey. And we have a sense of characterization: a stubborn or determined elderly woman. Although we do not know the precise setting, we can rule out Plato’s Athens, Italy under the Borgias and countless others. All of that in eight words. Yet what matters most is that we have direction—that O’Connor’s opening is not static.

Immediately, we face a series of potential questions: Why didn’t the grandmother want to go to Florida? Where else, if anywhere, did she wish to go? Who did want to go to Florida? A successful opening line raises multiple questions, but not an infinite number. In other words, it carries momentum.

2. Resist the urge to start too early. You might be tempted to begin your narrative before the action actually starts, such as when a character wakes up to what will eventually be a challenging or dramatic day. But unless you’re rewriting Sleeping Beauty, waking up is rarely challenging or dramatic. Often, when we start this way, it’s because we’re struggling to write our way into the narrative, rather than letting the story develop momentum of its own. Far better to begin at the first moment of large-scale conflict. If the protagonist’s early-morning rituals are essential to the story line, or merely entertaining, they can always be included in backstory or flashbacks—or later, when he wakes up for a second time.

3. Remember that small hooks catch more fish than big ones. Many writers are taught that the more unusual or extreme their opening line, the more likely they are to “hook” the reader. But what we’re not taught is that such large hooks also have the power to easily disappoint readers if the subsequent narrative doesn’t measure up. If you begin writing at the most dramatic or tense moment in your story, you have nowhere to go but downhill. Similarly, if your hook is extremely strange or misleading, you might have trouble living up to its odd expectations. As a fishing buddy of mine explains, the trick is to use the smallest hook possible to make a catch—and then to pull like crazy in the opposite direction.

4. Open at a distance and close in. In modern cinema, films commonly begin with the camera focused close up on an object and then draw back panoramically, often to revelatory effect, such as when what appears to be a nude form is actually revealed to be a piece of fruit. This technique rarely works in prose. Most readers prefer to be “grounded” in context and then to focus in. Open your story accordingly.

5. Avoid getting ahead of your reader. One of the easiest pitfalls in starting a story is to begin with an opening line that is confusing upon first reading, but that makes perfect sense once the reader learns additional information later in the story. The problem is that few readers, if confused, will ever make it that far. This is not to say that you can’t include information in your opening that acquires additional meaning once the reader learns more. That technique is often a highly rewarding tool. But the opening should make sense on both levels—with and without knowledge the reader will acquire later.

6. Start with a minor mystery. While you don’t want to confuse your readers, presenting them with a puzzle can be highly effective—particularly if the narrator is also puzzled. This has the instant effect of making the reader and narrator partners in crime. An unanswered question can even encompass an entire novel, as when David Copperfield asks, “Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.”

7. Keep talk to a minimum. If you feel compelled to begin a story with dialogue, keep in mind that you’re thrusting your readers directly into a maelstrom in which it’s easy to lose them. One possible way around this is to begin with a single line of dialogue and then to draw back and to offer additional context before proceeding with the rest of the conversation—a rare instance in which starting close up and then providing a panorama sometimes works. But long sequences of dialogue at the outset of a story usually prove difficult to follow.

8. Be mindful of what works. Once you’ve given some concentrated thought to your own opening line, obtain copies of anthologies like The Best American Short Stories and The PEN/O. Henry Prize Stories and read only the first sentence of each story. As with any other aspect of writing, openings are their own distinct art form—and exposure to the masterwork of others is one of the best ways to learn. (Of course, the challenge of this exercise is to avoid being lured into a story with such a compelling opening that you aren’t able to put it down!)

9. When in doubt, test several options. Writers are often advised to make a short list of titles and try them out on friends and family. Try doing the same with opening sentences. An opening line, like a title, sometimes seems truly perfect—until you come up with several even better choices.

10. Revisit the beginning once you reach the end. Sometimes a story evolves so significantly during the writing process that an opening line, no matter how brilliant, no longer applies to the story that follows. The only way to know this is to reconsider the opening sentence, like the title, once the final draft of the story is complete. Often a new opening is called for. That doesn’t mean your first opening needs to be scrapped entirely; instead, file it away for use in a future project.

Needless to say, a brilliant opening line cannot salvage a story that lacks other merits, nor will your story be accepted for publication based on the opening alone. But in a literary environment where journals and publishing houses receive large quantities of submissions, a distinctive opening line can help define a piece. A riveting opening can even serve as shorthand for an entire story, so that harried editors, sitting around a table as they evaluate the crème de la slush pile, may refer to your piece not by its title, but as “the one that begins with the clocks striking 13” (as does George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four). Even after the rest of the story has evaporated from conscious memory, the opening may stick with editors, an iron peg upon which to hang their hats—and, with any luck, it will have that effect on readers, too.

Also, check out my writing prompts! Maybe they’ll help :)

#write

the-writers-society-deactivated

How to Create a Flexible Outline for Any Story

“Mention the word outline in a room full of writers, and you’re sure to ignite a firestorm of passionate debate. Writers either love outlines, or they hate them. We either find them liberating, or we can’t stand how confining they are.

My experience has been that more often than not, those who swear they dislike outlines are thinking of them in the wrong ways. Outlines are not meant to trap you into preset ideas or sap your creativity before you start the first draft. Outlines are also definitely not meant to be lifeless Roman-numeral lists.”

—by K.M. Weiland

There are many names for a plot outline; one of our favorites is the plot skeleton. Some people also call it “the universal plot,” while others simply call it “basic structure.” Whatever you refer to it as, the plot outline is what will hold up your story if you know how to use it—or cause it to collapse if you don’t.

Many people, when they learn what a plot outline is, fail to see the point of it. Why, they ask, would they want to use a format that is found in every other story known to humankind—where is the creativity in that? the sense of art? The answer is simple: it works. There’s a reason why every story that touches your emotions sounds familiar when you strip it down to its bare bones.

Craft your premise.

Your premise is the basic idea for your story. But it’s not enough to just have an idea. “Guy saves girl in an intergalactic setting” is a premise, but it’s also far too vague to offer much solid story guidance.

This is why your outline needs to begin with a tightly crafted premise sentence that can answer the following questions:

Who is the protagonist?

What is the situation? What is the hero’s personal condition at the beginning? How will that condition be changed, for better or worse, by the hero himself or by the antagonistic force?

What is the protagonist’s objective? At the beginning, what does the hero want? What moral (or immoral) choices will she have to make in her attempt to gain

Who is the opponent? Who or what stands in the way of the hero achieving his objective?

What will be the disaster? What misfortune will befall the hero as the result of her attempts to achieve her objective?

What’s the conflict? What conflict will result from the hero’s reaction to the disaster? And what is the logical flow of cause and effect that will allow this conflict to continue throughout the story?

Once you’ve answered these questions, combine them into one or two sentences:

Restless farm boy (situation) Luke Skywalker (protagonist) wants nothing more than to leave home and become a starfighter pilot, so he can live up to his mysterious father (objective). But when his aunt and uncle are murdered (disaster) after purchasing renegade droids, Luke must free the droids’ beautiful owner and discover a way to stop (conflict) the evil Empire (opponent) and its apocalyptic Death Star.

Roughly sketch scene ideas.

Armed with a solid premise, you can now begin sketching your ideas for this story. Write a list of everything you already know about your story. You’ll probably come to this step with a handful of scenes already in mind. Even if you have no idea how these scenes will play out in the story, go ahead and add them to the list. At this point, your primary goal is to remember and record every idea you’ve had in relation to this story.

Once you’ve finished, take a moment to review your list. Whenever you encounter an idea that raises questions, highlight it. If you don’t know why your character is fighting a duel in one scene, highlight it. If you don’t know how two scenes will connect, highlight them. If you can’t picture the setting for one of the scenes, highlight that, too. By pausing to identify possible plot holes now, you’ll be able to save yourself a ton of rewriting later on.

Your next step is to address each of the highlighted portions, one by one. Write out your ideas and let your thoughts flow without censoring yourself. Because this is the most unstructured step of your outline, this will be your best opportunity to unleash your creativity and plumb the depths of your story’s potential. Ask yourself questions on the page. Talk to yourself without worrying about punctuation or spelling.

Every time you think you’ve come up with a good idea, take a moment to ask yourself, “Will the reader expect this?” If the answer is yes, write a list of alternatives your readers won’t expect.

Interview your characters.

In order to craft a cast of characters that can help your plot reach its utmost potential, you’ll need to discover crucial details about them, not necessarily at the beginning of their lives but at the beginning of the story.

To do this for your protagonist, work backward from the moment in which he will become engaged in your plot (the “disaster” in your premise sentence). What events in your protagonist’s life have led him to this moment? Did something in his past cause the disaster? What events have shaped him to make him respond to the disaster in the way he does? What unresolved issues from his past can further complicate the plot’s spiral of events?

Once you have a basic idea of how your character will be invested in the main story, you can start unearthing the nitty-gritty details of his life with a character interview. You may choose to follow a preset list of questions (you can find a list of more than 100 such questions in my book Outlining Your Novel: Map Your Way to Success), or you may have better luck with a “freehand interview” in which you ask your protagonist a series of questions and allow him to answer in his own words.

Explore your settings.

Whether your setting is your childhood neighborhood or the seventh moon of Barsoom, you’ll want to enter your first draft with a firm idea of where your prominent scenes will be taking place.

Don’t choose a setting just because it sounds cool or because you’re familiar with it. Look for settings that will be inherent to your plot. Can you change your story’s primary locale without any significant alterations to the plot? If so, dig a little deeper to find a setting better suited to your plot, theme and characters.

Based on the scenes you’re already aware of, list the settings you think you’ll need. Can you reduce this list by combining or eliminating settings? Nothing wrong with a sprawling story locale, but extraneous settings should be eliminated just as assiduously as unnecessary characters.

Write your complete outline.

You’re finally ready to outline your story in full. This is where you will begin plotting in earnest. In Step 2, you solidified the big picture of your story by identifying the scenes you were already aware of and figuring out how they might fit together. Now, you will work through your story linearly, scene by scene, numbering each one as you go. Unlike the “sketches” in Step 2, in which your primary focus was on brainstorming and exploring possibilities, you will now be concentrating on molding your existing ideas into a solid structure.

How comprehensive you want to be is up to you. You may choose to write a single sentence for each scene (“Dana meets Joe at the café to discuss their impending nuptials”), or you may choose to flesh out more details (“Joe is sitting by himself in a booth when Dana arrives; Dana orders coffee and a muffin; they fight about the invitation list”). Either way, focus on identifying and strengthening the key components of each scene’s structure. Who will be your narrating character? What is his goal? What obstacle will arise to obstruct that goal and create conflict? What will be the outcome, and how will your character react to the resulting dilemma? What decision will he reach that will fuel the next scene’s goal?

Work to create a linear, well-structured plot with no gaps in the story (see the checklist on the opposite page). If you can get this foundation right in your outline, you’ll later be free to apply all your focus and imagination to the first draft and bring your story to life.

As you mentally work through each scene, watch for possible lapses of logic or blank areas in how one event builds to another. Take the time to think through these potential problems so they won’t trip you up later. If you get stuck, try jumping ahead to the next scene you know, and then working backward. For instance, if you know where you want your characters to end up, but not how they’ll get there, start at the ending point and then see if you can figure out what has to happen in the preceding events to make it plausible.

Condense your outline.

Once you’ve finished your extended outline, you may want to condense the most pertinent points into an abbreviated version. Doing so allows you to weed out extraneous thoughts and summarize the entire outline into a scannable list for easier reference. Because your full outline may contain a fair amount of rambling and thinking out loud on the page, you’re likely to end up with a lot of notes to review (I often have nearly three notebooks of material). Rather than having to wade through the bulk of your notes every time you sit down to work on your first draft, you can save yourself time in the long run by doing a little organizing now.

You may choose to create your abbreviated outline in a Word document, write out your scenes on index cards, or use a software program such as the free Scrivener alternative yWriter

Put your outline into action.

By now, you’ll be feeling prepared and eager to get going on your first draft. Each time you sit down to work on your manuscript, begin by reviewing your outline. Read the notes for your current scene and the scene to follow. Before you start writing, work through any remaining potential problems in your head or on paper. If the time comes (and it will come) when you’re struck with a better idea than what you had planned in your outline, don’t hesitate to go off-road. These ventures into unknown territory can result in some of the most surprising and intriguing parts of your story.

An outline will offer you invaluable structure and guidance as you write your first draft, but never be afraid to explore new ideas as they occur. Remember, your outline is a map showing you the route to your destination, but that doesn’t mean it is the only route.

Remember, a plot skeleton is only bones…

Many writers forget that a skeleton is just that—bare bones. Humans all have skeletons that look pretty much alike, but we all look vastly different when flesh, hair, and snazzy clothes cover them up. The plot outline is not the be-all and end-all of your plot; it’s just the scaffolding holding up the walls of your construction. The complication that sends your character into distress does not have to be huge; your main character doesn’t have to be charged with recovering stolen nuclear weapons or with the task of taking a magic ring to Mount Doom to save all of humanity. Your character might be a sweet but socially challenged man, who, in the search for his sweetheart, bungles through all kinds of schemes to meet women before discovering that his next-door neighbor was the woman of his dreams all along. She could be a teenage girl, desperately trying to find herself, who dyes her hair electric blue, gets a belly ring, or takes up cheerleading to boost her popularity only to find that all she needed was one true friend. All of these stories follow the plot outline archetype previously described, yet each is dramatically different, and each has a good plot.

The possibilities are endless. You are not limited to any specific genre—the plot outline is truly universal. Your hopeless young man could live in China, India, or Milwaukee, and the story could be set in the present, the 1930s, or 300 years into the future. Ultimately, it is up to the author to wrap his or her plot skeleton in muscle, sinew, and skin, placing within it the heart that will make a unique and beautiful literary creation.

I hope this helped! Have any questions? Feel free to drop by my ask box!

#write

femmefatale-rps

What are your favorite Latin phrases or just phrases in general?

omg this is a cool question, let me try to recall some of my favs:

per adua ad astra, and all it’s variations (per aspera ad astra, sic itur ad astra, and so on). they’re all various ways of saying “through hardship, you will go the stars”. Idk, ever since I first learned the phrase, it’s always stuck with me as one of the most beautiful expressions.

Veni, vidi, vici- I came, I saw, I conquered. It sounds imposing and powerful and like something i’d have tattoed on myself if i was a battle-scarred warrioress.

semper ad meliora- always towards better things. I like it simply because a) it sounds nice to say (which is a common factor for all my favorite phrases, tbh) and b) it’s inspirational, as cheesy as that seems.

Auribus Teneo Lupum- “I hold the wolf by the ears,” this one is actually an ancient proverb.

bellum se ipsum alet- “war feeds itself”

capax infiniti- “holding infinity”

luctor et emergo- “I struggle and emerge”

dum vivimus, vivamus- “while we live, let us live”

“ita vero” is a phrase I always wish I could have courage to throw out in casual conversation, since it just means “thus indeed” and it’d be hella eloquent to use it while trying to sound smart.

lux aeterna- “eternal light”

nec aspera terrent- “they do not fear the difficulties”

#write

writeworld-blog

Writer’s Block

A picture says a thousand words. Write them.

Mission: Write a story, a description, a poem, a metaphor, a commentary, or a critique about this picture. Write something about this picture.

Be sure to tag writeworld in your block!

thestardazed-deactivated2020072

Plant Life

I’ve been listening to a lot of Owl City lately. Those lyrics really stir up the imagination.

ladyarrowhead

@sorceringing ♡♡♡

lgbtqi-support-equality

Non-Binary Pride Flag mood board #1

(please leave caption, all photos are mine)

thatll-do

waluigi is non binary

lgbtqi-support-equality

confirmed

craigslits

intensional

strawberryhorrorshow

Being abused made me such a “good kid.”

I was

Always polite

Never acted without permission

Never spoke out of turn

Always did what I was told

And it’s shitty that I was considered mature and praised for those things, and all of those characteristics have translated into me being an immature, “bad adult.”

Now I

Have difficulty making a keeping friends

Can’t act without permission/am dependent on others for direction

Am terrible at communicating

Have no agency/personal compass

It’s a really difficult thing for people who were abused as children to grapple with. What made us good children make us bad adults.