Help needed for story - part 1

[Berry]

Ooohhh.... ask me about writing, and I will give you a good answer!

I want to do this professionally (write, the dream job!), but my goals for myself have to be realistic.

JM

Okay, you convinced me. I now respect your knowledge of writing. You did not say a single thing I can seriously disagree with.

My personal approach is to wing it until I hit a snag then I use plotting as a tool to solve any problems. Some stories have none, some have a bunch. My preference is character based stories.

I also use omniscient multiple POV in larger works.

One question to ask you since you brought it up. You want to be a professional: How do you take criticism? Rejection slips are rough, but sometimes having to redraft a work for someone who is interested in buying if you can get it to their standards is even rougher. Can you take that kind of heat and not take it personally?

 

[JMackay]

JKMacKay,

well said... I agree with everything you have said...

Where would you find better editors that you trust? I have met few other writers, they had suggested that I can join writing class online and get their feedback. Do you trust that one too? If I submit my work for a review, will they steal it...but the problem is, you must read other people's work. What if you are not a preofessional to read other people's work???

I did the same thing you did..I just write, write, write, read, read, write, write, read, read and so on... But the problem is you need another set of eyes, lol...

I just start a memior a year ago, is there a rule about writing a memior like in any other geres? Or you just write the way you want it since it is your story in real life? (Of course I make up names and places to prevent our idenity.)

I did the writer's groups in college with print copies they had to return to me, marked with comments. The general rule we followed was, you can't just write 'it totally sucks' without saying WHY. They are supposed to give constructive criticism, meant to help the writer improve the next draft.

I will only email a draft to someone I trust implicitly to do test reading for me. I don't want to suffer Ms. Meyer's fate. My hearing family has been looking at it, asking me questions, and pointing out any flaws in logic or contradictions. (Spell check doesn't catch every error, neither does a grammar checker computer program.) Line by line reading is the only way, and I can't always "divorce myself" from my story to catch stuff I missed.

You can fictionalize your personal experiences, of course, if it's a memoir and you want it to be NON FICTION (100% TRUE), you wouldn't market to the fiction genres (Adventure, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, Suspense, Mystery, Crime Fiction, or Romance publishers).

If it is in a genre, you need to know which one you're writing. Sometimes Fantasy and SF cross over into what is called a hybrid, or it has elements of both magic and science. I've read a few successfully done stories like this.

Identify what you want to do with it:

a) Is it 100% true, with names changed to protect the innocent or guilty? Then it is NON FICTION.

B) Or is it a story based on YOUR knowledge of a topic, but COMPLETELY fiction otherwise? It could be MAINSTREAM Fiction or a genre story.

If it is genre fiction, don't market it to a mainstream (non-genre) publisher. There are guide books out there for help--The Writer's Market books are the best. They update it yearly with a listing of publishers, but they don't list every single one out there. I believe they have a separate volume for SF and Fantasy publishers. (I'm not interested in buying more information that I need.)

For examples of some genre writers, try these:

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Sherlock Holmes (Mysteries), Carolyn Keene, Nancy Drew mysteries

Isaac Asimov, I, Robot (SF), George Orwell, 1984, (SF), HG Wells, The Time Machine (SF), Ursula K. LeGuin, The Left Hand of Darkness (SF, also writes Fantasy), Octavia Butler (African American SF)

Mercedes Lackey, Arrows trilogy (her first set of 3 books, Fantasy), Kate Elliott, Crown of Stars series (7 books, excellent writer, master of complicated, detailed plot, Epic Fantasy)

Stephen King, Anne Rice, Dean Koontz, Clive Barker, Horror genre

Danielle Steele, Romance (I don't read a lot of Adult Romance books, so I can't give you a lot of names here.)

You get the idea. Sometimes stories can have multiple genre elements, i.e., the teen Twilight series has a mainstream fiction book feel at first in the beginning of the story, but then it is Horror and part Romance. So mixing the two genres can be done.

Some old Classic Lit falls into the genres, like Bram Stoker (Dracula) is Horror. Mary Shelly, Frankenstein, also Horror. (But you won't get a load of crap from a Creative Writing teacher for reading those, where you may for reading Star Trek novels! Some college professors don't take genre fiction seriously and they see it as escapist. SO WHAT? SUE ME!! TELL THAT TO PROFESSOR TOLKIEN! See who has the LAST LAUGH! I will, when I go to the bank. (See my comments on Creative Writing classes below.)

Again, check The Writer's Market and see what kind of stories which publisher accepts, and find out their submission guidelines--finish and edit!--first! Otherwise unsolicited submissions go in what they call "THE SLUSH PILE."

Talk to some PRO writers, learn all you can if you intend to do a pro sale. Try out a Creative Writing class at your community college, but be prepared that if you LIKE genre fiction, some professors DO NOT. (Mine was VERY prejudiced! He was a Literary SNOB.) :roll:

AND KEEP WRITING!! Keep in mind that if you get a sale, your editor and copy editor will go over your manuscript and want re-writes.

JM

 

[JMackay]

Okay, you convinced me. I now respect your knowledge of writing. You did not say a single thing I can seriously disagree with.

My personal approach is to wing it until I hit a snag then I use plotting as a tool to solve any problems. Some stories have none, some have a bunch. My preference is character based stories.

I also use omniscient multiple POV in larger works.

One question to ask you since you brought it up. You want to be a professional: How do you take criticism? Rejection slips are rough, but sometimes having to redraft a work for someone who is interested in buying if you can get it to their standards is even rougher. Can you take that kind of heat and not take it personally?

I'm getting practice taking criticism with the test readers. I got used to it from my English teachers in middle school, too. You just develop a thicker skin. Totally saying it sucks won't fly with me, but if you give me a good reason why Susie Q can't be living on Venus without a special space suit, I promise to rethink my logic and investigate, go back, and edit!

I prefer character driven stories.

I've only been able to write first person in short story format. In novel format, it's too darned limiting for my taste. The omnipotent, all-seeing narrator POV works best for me. It's the most common POV in SF and Fantasy novels. First person works for certain things, but I prefer exploring the psyches of my other characters, rather than just ONE in first person.

Plots are rejectable... I've ditched entire chapters because I haven't been able to get something to mesh right. I'll start over! Writing really doesn't have set rules--pros will tell you do what works best for you.

If you make your deadline and the book is published, the editor is happy.

I have to get some stuff finished first to market--I've researched HOW, now is WHEN... That annoying day job means I write after work, on weekends, on paper if I have to (I need a laptop!), and type it up later.

Harlan Ellison, a well-known SF writer (he won't say he's SF author, though, he's a little strange) can sit down and WRITE start to finish, a short story with a type writer from an idea someone handed him on a piece of paper. He did that as a challenge once. He's Mr. Opinionated, and he consulted with the creator of Babylon 5 TV series on how to make his story for the show better.

I read one of his short stories in Asimov's SF a number of years ago about a computer turning into a vampire--now that was funny and very creative... (The keyboard bit his character!)

I'm a little slower at getting finished, though.

Pace yourself and do what works for you. Not everyone has a full 8 hours a day to write. I don't, and I've met pros who still work in other fields. Writing is extra income for them.

My uncle is a retired school teacher.

John Grisham was a lawyer, Michael Crighton worked in the medical field (Jurassic Park).

Mercedes Lackey spreads herself out more by co-authoring a lot of books with newer SF/F writers. More books=more sales. She also has no kids to speak of and didn't do this for her living in the beginning. So anything is possible! (She rehabs injured birds of prey and has a license to do that, so when she describes these birds, she has first hand experience handling the wild creatures.)

Yay!! Go writing team!

JM

 

[restless_heart]

Thanks!

I'm going to ask some deaf friends of mine to look at my rough drafts and comment on it. I've had other test readers (hearing) review it, too.

Have you professionally published your work?

JM

Oh please do. It is a great idea to do that. Because for an example I have read Stephen King's The Stand. He didn't do a good job describing a deaf and mute character in the story. I felt he should do better than that. The Stand is still an excellent book, but I felt he should do better with describing a deaf and mute character...So beware, deaf readers will be reading your work, not just hearing people.

Yes, I have written four series for teens (horror), two novels for adults (horror and suspense), and a memoirs. All are unpublished. I gave up trying with my first novel several years ago. Long story...but to make it short, an editor of mine did a huge mistake. I have to take my orginal back to the way I have written because all what she had taken out was scene/structures. I had to rewrite the story all over again since I have lost all my orginal work...grrr....I knew from the beginning that something was funny about my work...

I did the writer's groups in college with print copies they had to return to me, marked with comments. The general rule we followed was, you can't just write 'it totally sucks' without saying WHY. They are supposed to give constructive criticism, meant to help the writer improve the next draft.

I will only email a draft to someone I trust implicitly to do test reading for me. I don't want to suffer Ms. Meyer's fate. My hearing family has been looking at it, asking me questions, and pointing out any flaws in logic or contradictions. (Spell check doesn't catch every error, neither does a grammar checker computer program.) Line by line reading is the only way, and I can't always "divorce myself" from my story to catch stuff I missed.

You can fictionalize your personal experiences, of course, if it's a memoir and you want it to be NON FICTION (100% TRUE), you wouldn't market to the fiction genres (Adventure, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, Suspense, Mystery, Crime Fiction, or Romance publishers).

If it is in a genre, you need to know which one you're writing. Sometimes Fantasy and SF cross over into what is called a hybrid, or it has elements of both magic and science. I've read a few successfully done stories like this.

Identify what you want to do with it:

a) Is it 100% true, with names changed to protect the innocent or guilty? Then it is NON FICTION.

Talk to some PRO writers, learn all you can if you intend to do a pro sale. Try out a Creative Writing class at your community college, but be prepared that if you LIKE genre fiction, some professors DO NOT. (Mine was VERY prejudiced! He was a Literary SNOB.) :roll:

AND KEEP WRITING!! Keep in mind that if you get a sale, your editor and copy editor will go over your manuscript and want re-writes.

JM

Oh I have never stop writing...The memior I am working on is 100 percent non-fiction. I am glad there is no rule about it since it is 100 percent true...

I will check out the writing class nearby. There is a college near me I can check out. I would feel better than doing online.

I am not only just a writer, I am addict to books as well. I am a fan of Stephen King, even Karin Slaughter, Patricia Cornwell, and so on...

Mmmm, oh is there any rule how many words you have written? Like the different btwn 40,000 and 80,000-100,000 words...In series, I have written appox 60,000 words each or less...

 

[JMackay]

Word length and accuracy in portraying a deaf character in writing

I think there's a guide for that on Google... Short stories are the shortest.

BEST short story writer ever, hands down (he is credited with inventing it), Edgar Allan Poe. (I read quite a bit of him in an advanced reading class in 8th grade eons ago. Love him!)

Word count - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Fiction Factor - How Long Should Your Story Be?

This one is more advice--good stuff!
» General advice I’ve found on: Word counts, novel length, and getting through the first draft

Word Count of a Full-Length Novel | Ask the Expert

Here's another that puts it in good terms, since writers are paid per word.

Word Count for Novels and Magazines

So we are aspiring writers.

I have only read Stephen King's book on writing. He is SO funny!

[ame=http://www.amazon.com/Writing-Memoir-Craft-Stephen-King/dp/0684853523]Amazon.com: On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft: Stephen King: Books[/ame]

Some excerpts from his book:

Excerpts from Stephen King's "On Writing" - (37signals)

I like SOME of the movies they do for his books, Carrie (creepy weird!), The Fire Starter, The Shining (Jack Nicholson is so scary!), Needful Things, but Cujo kind of was too scary for me when I was younger. He does some really good short stories, like the film Jonny Depp did... forgot the name, about a writer's character coming to life and looking for him. Freaky!

Next part:

Of course I want someone deaf to read my draft! If I screwed up something really badly, I wanna know! I'm not deaf and can't claim to get it right from his perspective a hundred percent.

I'm trying to make it a positive story about a friendship between the two worlds. It is SF, too, but has a mainstream element feel to it. (I already explained what I meant by that, so won't reiterate it.)

I was reading the deaf education thread for experiences like this, and there's 3 or so kids on there talking about how they liked the more challenging classes and stuff. (I did read up on the state school for the deaf in OR, the state where my story is taking place. OSSD= no AP classes.)

Not trying to start a controversy anywhere, because I know people have strong feelings about things in deaf ed. It comes down to choices. I never went to OSSD, but I personally ATTENDED mainstream schools with deaf kids. I can honestly write something, even in fictional format, about that, and what it's like from that perspective.

Being around kids signing made me honestly curious. My stupid school had no ASL classes offered so we could communicate with each other! ARRRGHHH!!! So frustrating! (I took Spanish 8th, 9th, and in college, and ASL 1 and 2 in college.)

I also had a deaf girl (oral) in my math class in HS. Her voice was hard to understand with all the yappy, loud hearing kids making it harder for me to hear her when she did try to talk to me. (We had the football coach for our teacher and there was NO order in that classroom!) We passed notes a lot. She was super nice! I was a nerd and didn't have a wide circle of friends.

My character has access to Deaf Community, and good support network at home with family who've bothered to learn to sign. Yes, there is conflict in the story, there has to be, or where's the plot? BUT my main goal is to have a sympathetic character my readers will care about enough to turn the next page. (My sister keeps bugging me to finish chapt 3! She took some sign classes to teach her baby ASL... seems that movie Meet the Fockers got her interested in it, and my other sister wants to do the same when she has kids.)

I don't have hearing aids, so I can't say what that's like. I haven't ever had to go to an audiologist, unless having my hearing tested once in grade school counts, but I don't know what that person's title was. I was a kid.

My work makes us have a hearing test annually because I work in an industrial plant with lots of machinery that make noise. The guy who does it comes with a truck with these booths we go sit in and put headphones on. He says my hearing is still normal, but I have trouble hearing the darn TV when they mumble or slur the words, and I have to crank the volume on the darn DVD!! I love captions.

Sometimes I get this annoying rings in my ears, I think they call it tinnitus? I have scarring on my right ear drum from ear infections when I was a kid. I thought I was going deaf, so I went to the doctor and he said I had too much wax stuck deep in my ear. They used this thing with hydrogen peroxide to squeeze it in my ears. He told me some people get worse build up and I was one of them. (I felt a little embarrassed!)

Some of my family members would complain if I had them on, but my hubby never cares. MY TV has a setting to turn them on automatically, or I can on the DVD if it's captioned. (Don't you hate it when they don't caption older movies on DVD? That is so aggravating!)

I love to watch Shakespeare movies captions on, because 16th century English is tougher to follow... gotta listen close. If Kenneth Branaugh is in it, I'm watching. He's really good!

So yes, there's some things I feel I can fairly address, and others that I need feedback from a deaf person's perspective--did I get this right? What do you think? How would you feel in my character's shoes if...? SF has a lot of WHAT IFS in it...

OK, I'll shut up now...

JM

 

[restless_heart]

Thank you for the links. they are very helpful.

I have Stephen King's On Writing. It was a great book and helpful too. That part about him poking a pencil in his ear Haha I had to laughed that one!!!

I loved his book on Duma key. It was hard to put down.

 

[JMackay]

need to read it again

Thank you for the links. they are very helpful.

I have Stephen King's On Writing. It was a great book and helpful too. That part about him poking a pencil in his ear Haha I had to laughed that one!!!

I loved his book on Duma key. It was hard to put down.

I browsed part of it at Barnes and Noble, and what I read was funny!

Glad to help with the links!

JM