As horror and thriller writer do you ever have nightmares about the books you’ve written?

Whenever I finish a manuscript I’m haunted by the recurring nightmare that I’ll never have another idea for a book! As far as my own work goes, I’ve spent so much time on the material that no matter how shocking or surprising it is to the reader (and hopefully it is), it’s kind of old hat for me. Most of my nightmares involve things like bad reviews and lack of sales…

What authors did you read when you were a kid?

As a kid I loved Edgar Allen Poe and Arthur Conan Doyle, as well as Franklin Dixon and the stable of authors who wrote the Hardy Boys mystery series. When I got a little older I discovered Stephen King and Dean Koontz as well as the outstanding crime writers Lawrence Block and Donald Westlake, and I went from being a twisted individual to a twisted writer.

Who are your some of your favorite authors now?

I’m still a fan of all the above-mentioned authors. I believe Tom Piccirilli is one of the most highly underrated authors around. I really dig Barry Eisler and Lee Child, as well as Sophie Littlefield, Vincent Zandri, Dave Zeltserman, F. Paul Wilson, debut author Heath Lowrance and about a thousand other outstanding writers I could name. There is a lot of great fiction being written right now in the genres I love.

Do you read outside the genre?

Not too much. Between writing my own stuff and reading thrillers and horror, I don’t have a lot of time to read other genres. Every once in a while I will read a non-fiction title, but that’s about it. My wife would tell you I’m already a master of romance, so reading, say, a romance novel would be kind of pointless for me.

Does your inspiration come from true events, past and present, or movies and other media?

That’s a really good question and a surprisingly tough one to answer. A lot of my short fiction is inspired by music, either individual songs or portions of lyrics. One of my favorite short stories, “Independence Day,” which was selected as a finalist for the 2010 Derringer award, was inspired by the haunting Bruce Springsteen song, “Racing in the Street.”

Mostly it’s a question of constantly asking myself, “What if?” I might see a situation on TV, or hear a snippet of a song lyric, or even overhear a portion of a conversation, and my imagination takes it from there.

What are the advantages of e-publishing?

I believe there are a lot, and one of the biggest is the abbreviated amount of time it takes to reach the reader. A print book with a major publisher takes 12-18 months or longer, and that’s after submission of the manuscript. E-publishing takes a fraction of that time, even after accounting for editorial input, rewrites, etc. It’s a pretty significant difference.

And despite the fact that advances are much smaller with epublishing, sometimes even nonexistent, the royalty rates are much higher, at least that’s the case with the three publishers I’ve worked with—Medallion Press, StoneHouse Ink, and Delirium Books. Also, much more control resides with the creator of the work, the author, which in my opinion has to be a good thing.

Are your books available on several different e-publishing platforms?

My two books currently available, FINAL VECTOR and POSTCARDS FROM THE APOCALYPSE, are available in all major ebook formats. My next thriller, THE LONELY MILE, will be released this summer—probably in July—by StoneHouse and will be also be available in all major formats. Same thing with my horror novella, DARKNESS FALLS, coming in September form Delirium Books. It is being released as a limited-edition collectible hardcover, but will be available in all ebook formats as well.

Do some platforms, i.e. Kindle, Smashwords have advantages over other e-publishing platforms?

Kindle holds the lion’s share of the ebook market at the moment, so that is a huge advantage for them. Barnes and Noble’s NOOK is steadily gaining ground, though, and is a major player as well. Smashwords is directed mainly toward self-publishing, and is the venue I used first to launch my short story collection, POSTCARDS FROM THE APOCALYPSE, although I made it available at Amazon for the Kindle shortly afterward.

Authors have to realize that limiting themselves to one format only, even if it’s the most popular, means you are unnecessarily limiting your sales. It’s important to give yourself the greatest opportunity to develop readership.

Do you read craft blogs and are there some favorites you’d like to share with us?

I worked closely with freelance editor Jodie Renner on THE LONELY MILE to ensure that manuscript was as well-constructed as possible before submitting it to StoneHouse Ink. She specializes in thrillers and blogs at a site called The Blood-Red Pencil (www.bloodredpencil.blogspot.com), and always has something interesting to say regarding the craft of writing.

Beyond that, I’m more interested in the take of my fellow writers to things happening in the world of writing than in craft specifically, since the craft of writing is so personal. What works for me may not work for you and vice-versa. Some of the author blogs I like to follow are JA Konrath’s (www.jakonrath.blogspot.com), Vincent Zandri’s (www.vincentzandri.blogspot.com), Murderati, a site featuring a rotation of several outstanding thriller writers (www.murderati.com), and of course my own, A Thrill a Minute (www.allanleverone.blogspot.com). Every once in a while I surprise myself and say something interesting, so I like to make sure I’m there when it happens.

***

Any horror or thriller writers out there? What’s your favorite horror/thriller novel or movie? Are there any blogs you read that help you with your writing process?

Sally Bayless joins us Wednesday to share her latest research method…the phone.

***

Bio: Allan Leverone is a three-time Derringer Award Finalist for excellence in short mystery fiction as well as a 2011 Pushcart Prize nominee. His short fiction has appeared in Needle: A Magazine of Noir, Shroud Magazine, Twisted Dreams, Dark Valentine, Mysterical-E and many others, and his debut thriller, FINAL VECTOR was released February 11 by Medallion Press. His second book, THE LONELY MILE, will be released this summer. Learn more on Facebook or at www.allanleverone.com.

We’re offering you a front row seat to Taylor Lunsford’s video pitch for her book, THE WARRIOR GROOM. Taylor’s summary was selected as an example for our pitch workshop and over the past two weeks, she’s been working with Diane to develop a pitch, a query letter and finally a video pitch. You can check out the progression of Taylor’s pitches and query letters on our Wednesday and Thursday posts.

Thank you Diane and Taylor for being with us again today. We’d also like to give a shout out to our other workshop entrants…Donya Pedigo, Lisa Fields and Margeanne Mitchell. Ladies, thanks for participating!

Romance University – Friday Wrap Up

What a great discussion we’ve had in the comments. I really appreciate everyone’s enthusiasm and actual participation. You guys are B-R-A-V-E!

Today, is all about extended learning. Because what are we? Pitch Geeks! Yes, we are.

Today’s Three Bonuses

#1 Learn from Lisa, Donya, and Margeanne.

As I mentioned on Wednesday, I’m working with 3 other Romance U writers, and I’ll be writing up their case studies over at Pitch U.  (Don’t forget:  Sign up for The Pitch Monthly, so you don’t miss these studies.)

They are awesome writers, and I’m really delighted to get to know them.

But here’s a preview of what we’ll be discussing:

From Lisa Fields’s query and pitch for HEALING HER HEART, her delightful Historical Romance:

• You have to be really careful of asking questions in a pitch or query unless you can guarantee the reader will answer “yes” or “holy cow this is really interesting!”
• If you can possibly read a phrase or comment as the title for a porn flick, you will (even if you’ve never seen porn).
• In your natural reply, you’ll usually clear up my confusion in a way that makes me fall in love with your characters.

From Donya Pedigo’s query and pitch for FINDING HOME, a heartfelt, 75,000-word, category novel intended for the Harlequin Superromance line:

• If you’re writing a story that is an internally-driven “journey,” your greatest aid and biggest challenge is the desire and need to explain.
• Making your character captivating to the reader/listener is probably more important than making her sympathetic.   (And she is captivating!)
• In a romance, what they see in each other is probably more important than why they need each other (in order to complete their character arc).  And, it’s not always easy to realize you’re doing one vs. the other.

From Margeanne Mitchell’s fun, single title, contemporary romance, YESTERDAY’S PLAYBOY:

• Sometimes, if you ask yourself, “What’s the setup?” you’ll come closer to finding  your pitch.
• It’s good to review a pitch to make sure the details, events, and word choices match the tone of the actual manuscript.
• Your willingness to start your pitch over and try again are what mark you as a professional.  (Margeanne is so professional, she’s all over that. <wink> )  In fact, the reason I do so many versions of pitches and queries myself is so I can explore how it would look if I came at it from a different angle.

#2 Learn from Taylor’s Pitch Video.

After our willing victims… volunteers (!), I mean… submitted their entry in the Romance U contest (and it was too late), that’s when I sprang my big request. I was hoping to convince our participants to create Pitch Videos. They agreed!

So far, we’ve focused on pitch and query content. But as we know, pitching requires the ability to say something coherent in person. We writers love our words on the page. We do not love that whole “say something that will affect your career out loud in front of someone important.”

I’m pleased to say, Taylor was all over the video. She did several takes, asked for feedback, and revised her approach. Take a look at what a pitch looks and sounds like.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxqexRUrVeU[/youtube]

Here’s what I LOVE about her video:

• She comes across as a nice person, professional, interested in talking about her book.
• She chose her background carefully and created a good impression with her appearance.
• She spoke up and spoke at the right tempo.
• She looked directly at the camera/viewer.
• She got nervous but didn’t let that stop her! It’s absolutely okay to be nervous.
• She gave a short pitch and then stopped. Pitches are conversations about creating a relationship with another person.  You “shut up” as my friend Lynn Lorenz says, and then the person you’re pitching to says something, maybe asks you question, or says “send it.”

Please join me in congratulating Taylor for doing what it took to master pitching and writing query letters. She is 100% awesome.

#3  Learn from Literary Agent Molly Jaffa of Folio Literary Management.

*** Molly Jaffa will be the agent we feature at our next PitchFest, starting this Sunday. She specializes in Middle Grade and Young Adult fiction. (Yes, you may pass the word!)

I asked Molly to review our pitches and queries and let us know if any of them actually worked.

It’s fine for us to *think* we’ve created greatness, but until you put it into practice you really don’t know if you’re right.

I sent her the pitch and query “before” and all the “afters.”

Molly Jaffa:  This is a strong transformation!

I love Taylor’s revised version of your pitch. It gives me a clear idea of who the protagonist and her love interest are, as well as what’s at stake for each of them. It’s short and to the point.

I also like the way the manuscript is positioned as a “reimagining of My Fair Lady”—the evocative phrasing lets me know exactly what to expect from the novel.

The transformation was remarkable—you guys did great work!

I’m over the moon!

I loved how, in Wednesday and Thursday’s comments, everyone had a different favorite pitch/query. Do you know why? They pretty much *all* worked.

You can drive yourself nuts picking apart your work. But remember, there are a hundred right answers. Once you get a pitch/query that actually reflects your book, you’re well on your way.

Now, I want to see all of you out at Pitch University. You have what it takes to really become awesome at pitching. All it takes is the willingness to learn and practice.

I now pronounce you all Pitch Geeks!

***

I’ll be working all day Friday to help all the brave writers who posted their pitches in the comments.

***

Okay, Pitch Geeks! Give us some feedback on Taylor’s video and post your pitches. If you have any questions  about pitches, queries, or anything we’ve discussed over the past three days, post it!

Urban fantasy writer CJ Redwine joins us on Monday, April 4th, for another installment of Query Writing 101.

***

Diane Holmes is the founder and Chief Alchemist of Pitch University, the only no-cost, 100% free website devoted to learning how to verbally pitch your book and answer the question, “What’s your book about?” Pitching is the skill you need to sell your book to agents, editors, and ultimately, readers. And the best part about Pitch U? You learn directly from the experts who pitch books for a living: agents, editors, and experts.

Hello to Romance University!   

In the past when it comes to pitching and query letters, there were two tribes of writers: (1) a few naturals and (2) the terrified majority. But it’s time to create a third tribe:  the writers who learned how to pitch and used that skill for the rest of their entire career. Pitching is what we do when we talk with readers. We need this skill.

And we need those queries, too. Queries (with their story “summaries”) are part of the written sales materials you need in order to sell your book and then to keep selling it (publisher’s sales staff, media, blog, Amazon page, etc.).  So today, we’re all about queries.

In the comments of this post, I’ll ask you to do two things:

• Let us know which query you think is most effective.
• Don’t forget to post your own pitch if you’d like some feedback on it, and I’ll do that on Friday.

Let’s take a look at Taylor’s original query:

Query Letter

Dear AGENT,

Growing up in India and fighting alongside Wellington didn’t prepare Colonel Aidan Cavanaugh, Marquess of Pierston to face the scrutiny of London society. Behind his cool, calm exterior, the former colonel is plagued by years of death and regret that he refuses to relinquish. Recently arrived in England, he must forge a life for himself away from military campaigns and find a bride who can help him find peace.

Self-declared spinster Katherine Burns defied the conventions of Regency society when she agreed to help the mysterious newcomer, Lord Pierston, learn to navigate the waters of the ton. She certainly never expected him to consider her a potential bride. His subtle campaign against her defenses threatens to expose her secrets and dissuade her from following her dreams of making a life for herself and her brother.

Independent to the core, Kate and Aidan must learn to trust in each other and their growing feelings for one another in the face of their personal demons. The Warrior Groom, my Regency romance novel, is complete at 91,000 words. It is a stand-alone novel with the potential for expansion into a trilogy. 

I am a senior English major, feminist studies minor, at Southwestern University, a small liberal arts university in Texas. The Warrior Groom is my second completed novel. My previous publishing credit is “Agape” in the anthology A Rush of Wings (Naked Reader Press, 2010).  

Thank you for your time and consideration.                                                                        

Sincerely,

Taylor Lunsford                                                                                                                      

Diane’s Commentary:                                              

This is pretty good, right? I agree.                                     

Our query letter discussion

Diane: Hi, Taylor!

Growing up in India and fighting alongside Wellington didn’t prepare Colonel Aidan Cavanaugh, Marquess of Pierston to face the scrutiny of London society.   

Diane:  Expectation - We must be talking about a historical novel!  A war novel?  Straight historical?  Historical romance?

Taylor:  Would it maybe help here if I used a clue word like “ton” instead of “society” to indicate that it’s a Regency romance?

***

Behind his cool, calm exterior, the former colonel is plagued by years of death and regret that he refuses to relinquish.

Diane: Expectation - This is a story about a battle-scarred, ex-military man.

Recently arrived in England, he must forge a life for himself away from military campaigns and find a bride who can help him find peace.

Diane: Expectation - This is a story about a man coming home from war and trying to reclaim an ordinary life, which is represented by having a wife and home.

Taylor:  So far, all of your expectations are correct. 

***

Self-declared spinster Katherine Burns defied the conventions of Regency society when she agreed to help the mysterious newcomer, Lord Pierston, learn to navigate the waters of the ton.

Diane: Expectation -  This is a fish out of water story, and the only person he can trust is her. Maybe kinda like the movie Splash, in a way? It seems that she is a woman who thinks of herself as an old spinster and is defying society; however, she’s the only person helping Pierston, even though for some reason it’s against society norms. Also, for some reason Lord Pierston never learned his own society, or he’s actually not from London.

Taylor:  I mention in the first sentence that he grew up in India, so he doesn’t know anything about life in London. Would it be a good idea to maybe indicate here the Kate is attracted to him to help build romantic tension?

Diane: Hangs head in shame at her short attention span….

***

She certainly never expected him to consider her a potential bride.

Diane:  Expectation -  This is a story about a man home from war who grabs onto the first helpful woman and proposes. The conflict will be that she doesn’t want to marry and prefers to be a spinster.

Taylor: It’s not that she’s the first helpful woman, but she’s the one who he feels a connection to and Kate wants to fight that connection b/c she has other plans, i.e. to be a writer like Jane Austen.

***

His subtle campaign against her defenses threatens to expose her secrets and dissuade her from following her dreams of making a life for herself and her brother.

Diane:  Expectation - This is the story about a secretive woman whose dream to provide for her brother is being thwarted by a man who wants her to marry him and give up her dream.

Taylor: It’s not so much that he wants her to give up her dream as she thinks that she can’t have both him and her dream of being a writer b/c of societal expectations of wives.

***

Independent to the core, Kate and Aidan must learn to trust in each other and their growing feelings for one another in the face of their personal demons.

Diane: There’s nothing wrong with this, but it could be used to describe many romance novels.   And this summary doesn’t seem to be proved by what comes before it.  For example, Pierston isn’t independent.  He’s desperate for a wife.  Just something to think about.

Taylor: I’ve struggled with this part. Yes, it could be used to describe a lot of romance novels, but I can’t seem to find another way to make the summary concise otherwise. I’m having the same issue with writing the official synopsis to send out to agents.

 ***

The Warrior Groom, my Regency romance novel, is complete at 91,000 words. It is a standalone novel with the potential for expansion into a trilogy.  

Diane: Expectation -  See, I was right!  It is a Regency romance!  Probably ought to put this up front.

***

I am a senior English major, feminist studies minor, at Southwestern University, a small liberal arts university in Texas. 

Diane: Go ahead and make the link between your studies and your book, because there is a link.  You’re obviously passionate about looking at gender roles in society, and there’s not a better place to do this than in the sub-genre known for its “comedy of manners.”

Taylor: I’ve heard that you should keep bios to a minimum and even been told to exclude this bit?

 ***

The Warrior Groom is my second completed novel.  

Diane: You probably don’t want to include this, because every writer has many completed and unpublished novels.  And some agents/editors may have an opinion about how many novels it takes before you know what you’re doing.

***

My previous publishing credit is “Agape” in the anthology A Rush of Wings (Naked Reader Press, 2010).  

Diane: Excellent.  Include this!

My thoughts on Taylor’s Pitch:

Growing up in India and fighting alongside Wellington didn’t prepare Aidan Cavanaugh, Marquess of Pierston to face the scrutiny of London society. Behind his cool, calm exterior, the former colonel is plagued by years of death and regret that he refuses to relinquish. Recently arrived in England, he must forge a new life for himself away from military campaigns and find a bride who can help him find peace.

Diane:  Expectation - This entire book will deal with the fall out of living India and serving in Wellington’s army.  He probably has PTSD, and this book will deal with that and his quest of peace and healing.

***

Spinster Katherine Burns defied her fears and society when she agreed to help the mysterious Lord Pierston learn to navigate the waters of the ton. She certainly never expected him to consider her a potential bride.

Diane: Expectation - Katherine is normally fearful; Aiden has secrets/mysteries she will need to uncover.   

***

As you remember from yesterday, Taylor and I chatted about her book.  And I was right about her story and high-concept (even though she had never thought of it that way), right up to the point where the he story diverged…  The tipoff was when she said, “Yes, and then it devolves from that.”

You need to pay attention to comments like that. It’s not that she was suddenly writing a different book. But until you get the beauty of the author’s vision, you aren’t getting the whole story. There’s something in the story that the author is saying or proving by the way it’s structured, that’s beyond the genre expectations. So really look for this.

And remember, I’ll have even more insights when I write up a full case study which will be available at Pitch University. If you go over there and sign up for The Monthly Pitch newsletter (below my radio interview), I’ll make sure you know when and how to get a copy.

Our NEW query letters

Taylor’s Version 1:

Dear…

The Warrior Groom, my Regency romance novel, is complete at 91,000 words. It is a standalone novel with the potential for expansion into a trilogy.

Colonel Aidan Cavanaugh, Marquess of Pierston, is more at home on the battlefield than in the ballroom. The only thing that has made sense since his arrival in London is his attraction to Miss Katherine Burns, the companion he’s convinced to teach him all he needs to know to survive the turbulent waters of the ton. Kate Burns decided long ago she would never marry. As a single woman, she answers to no one and she’s perfectly happy that way, but the dashing new marquess tests her resolve to the breaking point.

From two different worlds, Aidan and Kate must find a way to keep her dream of writing novels and his difficulty in sharing his past from standing in the way of the love that has grown between them.

I am a senior English major, feminist studies minor, at Southwestern University, a small liberal arts university in Texas. My previous publishing credit is “Agape” in the anthology A Rush of Wings (Naked Reader Press, 2010). 

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,

Taylor Lunsford

 ***

Taylor’s Version 2:

Dear…

The Warrior Groom, my Regency romance novel, is complete at 91,000 words. It is a standalone novel with the potential for expansion into a trilogy.

Katherine Burns convinced herself long ago that marriage was not for her. When Colonel Aidan Cavanaugh, Marquess of Pierston, recently arrived in London from India, asks her to help him learn the ways of the ton, she never suspected that his interest in her was of a decidedly romantic nature. Before she knows it, Kate finds herself falling in love with this man who asks so much of her, yet gives so little of himself.

It is up to the battle-hardened, but dashing new marquess to show Kate that she can be both a writer and a wife, despite what society might tell her.

I am a senior English major, feminist studies minor, at Southwestern University, a small liberal arts university in Texas. My previous publishing credit is “Agape” in the anthology A Rush of Wings (Naked Reader Press, 2010).

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,

Taylor Lunsford

 ***

Taylor’s Version 3:

Dear…

The Warrior Groom, my Regency romance novel, is complete at 91,000 words. It is a standalone novel with the potential for expansion into a trilogy.

Katherine Burns never expected helping a dashing stranger across the dinner table would lead to this. Colonel Aidan Cavanaugh, the new Marquess of Pierston has asked her to consider helping him learn all about the society he missed growing up in India. Every proper inclination tells her to say ‘no,’ but she all she can say is ‘yes.’ His subtle campaign against her defenses threatens to expose her secrets and dissuade her from following her dreams.

Finding a bride hadn’t crossed Aidan’s mind until he saw Kate, but now he’s determined to have her. Winning the heart of the stubborn spinster would require more effort than any war he’d fought in, but the peace he would find with her by his side is too great to let slip away.

I am a senior English major, feminist studies minor, at Southwestern University, a small liberal arts university in Texas. My previous publishing credit is “Agape” in the anthology A Rush of Wings (Naked Reader Press, 2010).

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,

Taylor Lunsford

 ***

Diane’s Version 1 (and only):

Taylor Lunsford’s The Warrior Groom is a 91,000-word Regency romance novel. Katherine Burns is determined to follow in the footsteps of Jane Austen—to never marry in favor of penning novels and living an truly independent lifestyle.  Unorthodox in the extreme.   Colonel Aidan Cavanaugh, the new Marquess of Pierston, is more at home on the battlefield than in the ballroom.  Having just set foot in England for the first time in his life, he is ill-prepared to play society’s most-eligible peers of the realm.

When Aidan spies Katherine,  he is captivated despite her unconventional age (24!).  Under the guise of requiring a tutor for his lack of social graces, he sets out to woo Katherine.  And the lessons are successful on both fronts.  But before the fairy tale can unfold and Aidan can capture her heart, they are thrust into reality and must deal with Katherine’s father’s alcoholism and gambling debts, as well as the truth of what marrying into nobility will require of a bride.  Society’s burdens do not allow room for women to become novelists.

As Aiden struggles to deal with his own memories of war and Katherine concludes that she cannot become the wife a Marquess requires, it takes a visit with Jane Austen herself to rectify the situation to the benefit of all.

The Warrior Groom– a retelling of My Fair Lady, if Eliza had hired Professor Higgins, and the genders where reversed—forces the fantasy of transformation to face the realities of family and the sacrifices demanded by social constraints.  And through love, all things are possible.

Sincerely, 

 **Note:  The line “more at home on the battlefield than in the ballroom” came directly from Taylor’s manuscript.   

***

Great query letters! Thanks to Diane and Taylor for sharing them with our readers. Does anyone have any questions about query letters (or pitches) for Diane? Nationals are coming up, so polish your pitch and post it in our comments section.

Okay, Friday we get to review Taylor’s pitch video, and we’ll hear from a real, live agent.  (Yes, we have one in captivity, but we’re most kind and considerate, feeding her tender shoots and over-ripe berries.  Then we bring in a massage therapist.)  Come by Friday to find out who she is and read my advice on *your* pitches.)

***

 
Diane Holmes is the founder and Chief Alchemist of Pitch University, the only no-cost, 100% free website devoted to learning how to verbally pitch your book and answer the question, “What’s your book about?” Pitching is the skill you need to sell your book to agents, editors, and ultimately, readers. And the best part about Pitch U? You learn directly from the experts who pitch books for a living:  agents, editors, and experts. 

Taylor Lunsford’s entry was selected as an example of how to develop an effective pitch. However, Diane’s generously offered to post the pitches for our other entrants on her site. 

Diane’s acquired a new espresso machine and in a caffeine-fueled frenzy, she’s gone beyond the call of duty and helped our entrants with their queries too.

Today, we’re concentrating on pitches, but Taylor’s revised queries will be posted on the RU site tomorrow. We’ll finish off the week with a video of Taylor’s pitch on Friday.

Diane, thanks so much for joining us today and thanks to Taylor for being our RU guinea pig.

Hello to Romance University! I’ve got my sleeves rolled up, and I’m ready to get my pitch on! I’ll be here today and Friday talking about how to create a great pitch… by actually working with a Romance U victim… er, I mean agreeable companion. Yeah, that’s what I mean. 

Taylor Lunsford has innocently agreed to step into my lair. Everyone, say hello to Taylor. (I’m also working with three other Romance U writers, and I’ll talk more about that on Friday.) 

So today, you’ll see exactly how Taylor and I worked together to create improved pitches for her complex Regency romance. I say pitches in the plural, because we came up with more than one version. 

I know you probably believe you’re looking for the One Pitch To Sell Them All, but here’s what I believe:  I think there are 100 right pitches (and 1,000 wrong pitches). You’re just looking for the most effective one you can write.

 In the comments of this post, I’ll ask you to do two things:

• Let us know which pitch you think is most effective.
• Post your own pitch if you’d like some feedback on it, and I’ll do that on Friday.

So, first, who am I? I’m the founder of Pitch University, a website devoted to learning and practicing pitching your book from agents, editors, and experts who make their living at it. 

I founded Pitch U because I sucked at pitching my own books. I don’t now, by the way, so take heart. You can become awesome at this skill. 

(I recently gave some insight into just how bad I used to be at pitching during a radio interview on Your Book is Your Hook with Jennifer Wilkov, plus I shared some insights on pitching you probably haven’t heard before. See the Pitch University website and look in the right-most column for the audio player. )

My Goal

In the game of verbal pitching, there are two things to master:  delivery and content. What I want to focus on is content. And when talking about content, again there are two things to master: words that sound good and get a ‘yes’, AND words that accurately reflect the book you’ve written.

I seriously believe that 90% of all pitches and query letters mislead the listener/reader. They’re true; they just don’t set the right expectations about what the book really is and how it will unfold.

Often the book is better than the pitch.

First, let’s see Taylor’s original pitch:

Title: THE WARRIOR GROOM by Taylor M. Lunsford

Growing up in India and fighting alongside Wellington didn’t prepare Aidan Cavanaugh, Marquess of Pierston, to face the scrutiny of London society. Behind his cool, calm exterior, the former colonel is plagued by years of death and regret that he refuses to relinquish. Recently arrived in England, he must forge a new life for himself away from military campaigns and find a bride who can help him find peace. 

Spinster Katherine Burns defied her fears and society when she agreed to help the mysterious Lord Pierston learn to navigate the waters of the ton. She certainly never expected him to consider her a potential bride 

Diane’s Commentary:

This is pretty good, right?  I agree.

My thoughts on Taylor’s Pitch:

Growing up in India… etc.

Diane
Expectation: This entire book will deal with the fallout of living in India and serving in Wellington’s army.  Aiden probably has PTSD, and this book will deal with that and his quest for peace and healing.

Spinster Katherine Burns… etc..

Diane
Expectation: Katherine is normally fearful; Aiden has secrets/mysteries she will need to uncover.   He has to convince her to marry him and quit being a spinster.

What came next – Query Letter, a list of events, and actual pages from the story

Then, I took Taylor’s query letter, wrote down my expectations based on each additional piece of information. She replied to each, and it soon became clear that  some of my expectations were way off. Good to know, eh?

And finally (this is going to sound strange coming from one fiction writer to another), we actually started dealing with reality. Taylor sent me a list of events from her first 75 pages plus the first 75 pages of her ms.  Again, I read events and listed my expectations, where I made an astounding discovery.  

Taylor actually has a high concept hidden in her book. Eureka. How could I be so lucky. That’s like Pitching Easy Street.

By then, I *thought* knew what her pitch was going to be. We scheduled time to talk over the phone, because the last piece (and this is really important) is to understand the trajectory and structure of the story all the way to the end. Not all the events. Not the inner and outer conflict. 

Plainly said, I needed to understand how the story would unfold. Implying is the magic word when it comes to crafting a pitch.  Because pitches are so short, you have to be very clever in what you say so that it implies everything you don’t say. 

So, we chatted (and Taylor is delightful!). And I was right about her story and high-concept (even though she’d never thought of it that way), right up to the point where it veered off.  

It’s not that she was suddenly writing a different book. It’s that I didn’t understand her whole vision for the story.

For more details on this piece of our work, including our entire query letter dissection and multiple new query versions, you’ll want to get the full “case study,” which will be available at Pitch University. If you go over there right now (I’ll wait) and sign up for The Monthly Pitch newsletter (below my radio interview), I’ll make sure you know when and how to get a free copy.

Result

Probably the main thing you’re going to say about the new pitches is, “Oh, I didn’t know it was about that!”  That’s the beauty of looking at accuracy, even if you have a good pitch.  The book is often more interesting than the pitch (or query) lets on.

Our NEW pitches

Diane’s Pitch Version 1 – Short Pitch:

Short Pitch.  Taylor Lunsford’s The Warrior Groom is a 91,000-word Regency romance novel. Katherine Burns is determined to follow in the footsteps of Jane Austen—to never marry in favor of penning novels. Colonel Aidan Cavanaugh has just stepped foot in England for the first time, and this new Marquess of Pierston, is more at home on the battlefield than in the ballroom. 

Aidan hires Katherine to teach him the ways of society, with the ulterior motive of wooing her, but when real life interrupts the fantasy, they’re forced to deal with family crises and social expectations , ultimately examining the wall they’ve each built around themselves in an effort to remain independent.

The Warrior Groom– a retelling of My Fair Lady, if Eliza had hired Professor Higgins, and the genders where reversed.

Diane’s Pitch Version 2 – Shorter Pitch:

Taylor Lunsford’s 91,000 word, Regency romance novel, The Warrior Groom, is a retelling of My Fair Lady… if Eliza had hired Professor Higgins, and the genders where reversed.  Katherine Burns embraces the independent writing lifestyle of Jane Austen.  Colonel Aidan Cavanaugh has never stepped foot in England before, but as the new Marquess, he must learn society’s rules and behavior before anyone realizes he’s lacking. Aidan hires Katherine, but fantasy meets harsh the reality of family crises and social obligation.

Diane’s Pitch Version 3:  Elevator Pitch.

Taylor Lunsford’s 91,000 word, Regency romance novel, The Warrior Groom, is a retelling of My Fair Lady… if Eliza had hired Professor Higgins, the genders where reversed, and the fantasy is forced to confront the realities of every-day life.

Taylor Tinkers With My Pitch for Voice – Version 1:  Short Pitch

Taylor Lunsford’s The Warrior Groom is a 91,000-word Regency romance novel. Katherine Burns is determined to follow in the footsteps of Jane Austen, eschewing marriage in favor of penning novels. Colonel Aidan Cavanaugh, the new Marquess of Pierston, has just set foot in England for the first time and is more at home on the battlefield than in the ballroom. 

Intent on spending more time with Kate, Aidan asks her to teach him the ways of society. When real life interrupts their romantic interlude, they’re forced to deal with family crises and social expectations, ultimately examining the walls they’ve built around themselves in an effort to remain independent.

The Warrior Groom– a reimagining of My Fair Lady where Henry Higgins asks Eliza for deportment lessons—forces the fantasy of transformation and love at first sight to face the realities of family and the sacrifices demanded by social constraints

Taylor Tinkers With My Pitch for Voice – Version 2:  Shorter Pitch

Taylor Lunsford’s 91,000 word Regency romance novel, The Warrior Groom,  is a reimagining of My Fair Lady where Henry Higgins asks Eliza for deportment lessons. Katherine Burns embraces the independent writing life modeled by Jane Austen.  Colonel Aidan Cavanaugh has never stepped foot in England before, but as a new Marquess, he must learn society’s rules and behavior before anyone realizes he’s lacking. Intent on spending more time with her, Aidan asks Katherine to teach him the ways of society, hoping she’ll fall in love with him along the way.

Taylor Tinkers With My Pitch for Voice – Version 3:  Elevator Pitch

Taylor Lunsford’s 91,000 word Regency romance novel, The Warrior Groom, is a reimagining of My Fair Lady where Henry Higgins asks Eliza for deportment lessons and where the fantasy of transformation and love at first sight must face the realities of family and the sacrifices demanded by social constraints

So, which is the most effective?

Taylor and I each have our favorites. So, what are your favorites? Does one version/length make you want to read her book more than another? Weigh in.  And if I’m really lucky, I’ll have an agent weigh in as well.

P.S.  Our new query letters were vastly different from one another, and different than these pitches.  You can take a look in the Case Study. 

***

We’d love to hear which pitches were your favorite or the most effective. Also, post your pitches today or on Friday and Diane will critique them. This is great practice for those of you who are planning to pitch at the RWA National Convention in NYC this year!
 

As a extra bonus, we’ll post the query for Taylor’s book tomorrow. Don’t forget to stop by and check out the video of Taylor’s pitch on Friday. Diane will be available to crit your pitches, so don’t be shy. Post your pitch!

***

Bio: Diane Holmes is the founder and Chief Alchemist of Pitch University, the only no-cost, 100% free website devoted to learning how to verbally pitch your book and answer the question, “What’s your book about?” Pitching is the skill you need to sell your book to agents, editors, and ultimately, readers. And the best part about Pitch U? You learn directly from the experts who pitch books for a living:  agents, editors, and experts. 

Diane’s background is in marketing, fiction writing, and community building. She has also founded writers’ groups, co-owned a small press, had plays produced, written novels and scripts, run writer’s contests, held offices in writing organizations, taught writing… and just like you, she sucks at pitching her own books.

When not working on Pitch University, she’s writing an espionage thriller. (She started out writing sweet romance, but that first book used up all her sweetness, and now she kills a lot of fictional people and makes really good  ”people” run for their lives. Villains? Oh, for pity’s sake, cover your eyes! Yeah, yeah, plus there’s ill-behaved romance and the power of love. Aw. Just watch out for the blood.) 
www.pitch-university.com

Hello, Tracy!

Dialogue…love writing it or hate it, dialogue is one of the first thing editors look for when reading a submission.

Great.  More pressure to have the right words come out of our characters’ mouths—to make our heroes’ and heroines’ personalities come alive. Or not.

Writing dialogue is hard work. So hard that we sometimes use the avoidance tactic of substituting big blocks of more easily written narrative, telling what was said instead of having characters speak. More often, we resort to dreaded mechanical tricks to ease the pain of writing dialogue that effectively conveys character and emotion.

Warning: AVOID THOSE TRICKS. That was my outdoor voice!

We want our dialogue to sound professional, to sing to that editor like Susan Boyle dreaming her dream on Britain’s Got Talent. So we have to identify the faulty mechanics that may seem to make dialogue strong, but only make it weaker. Editors know these tricks. They have e-mail outboxes full of rejections to prove it.

What tricks, what tricks?

Explaining Dialogue to Readers

“I can’t believe it,” she said in astonishment.

Telling the reader how our heroine feels does them a favor, right? Saves them the energy of having to figure it out for themselves. But our readers want to engage, they want to figure it out. If our dialogue is well-written, there’s no need to patronize readers by explaining the obvious. “I can’t believe it” conveys astonishment without explanation.

Pushing an Emotion on Readers

“It’s dark in there,” she said, frightened.

So our heroine is frightened. It says so. But we want the reader to feel the emotion, to be as frightened as she is. But “It’s dark in there” doesn’t convey fright.  If the dialogue doesn’t show the emotion, there is tension between the dialogue and the explanation. Readers may not notice this, but editors sure will. And readers will have a niggling idea that something is wrong.

Using Adverbs to Explain Dialogue

“Come here,” she said lovingly.

We’re smuggling emotions into our dialogue here. Our best bet is to keep the –ly adverbs to a minimum—seriously!

But wait, if giving up the –lys sounds worse than giving up a daily 2pm Diet Coke fix, there are exceptions! If your adverbs modify the verb said, you can keep them. Think “she said softly.” Softly is how she said the words—a dialogue cue. Lovingly, above, is how she felt when she said, “Come here.” We need to show her lovingness through word choice, body language and context, not with an –ly adverb.

Slipping Explanations into Speaker Attributions

The only reason we need speaker attributions is so our readers know who is talking. One dreaded trick is using speaker attributions to slip in explanations of dialogue. “She purred.”  “He growled.” While animal sounds have their place (usually at a zoo), using verbs like these for attributions task our characters with an action that is physically impossible. Have you ever purred or growled a sentence? Go ahead, make that purring sound with your tongue and try to speak!

Avoiding ‘Said’

As afraid as we may be to see too many saids threading through our pages, for speaker attributions, said is almost always the right verb. We love variety—demanded, inquired, replied. But the reason those verbs don’t work is that they draw attention away from the dialogue, jumping out at readers and distracting them with writing mechanics.

Well-renowned editors Renni Browne and Dave King make the best argument in their book Self-Editing for Fiction Writers. “Said isn’t even read the way other verbs are read. It is, and should be, an almost purely mechanical device—more like a punctuation mark than a verb. It’s absolutely transparent, which makes it graceful and elegant. Which, actually, is another reason to avoid explanations and adverbs. Even when you use them with said (we said sternly), they tend to entangle your readers in your technique rather than leaving them free to concentrate on your dialogue.”

Behold our new favorite attribution: SAID. I wish I knew how to type a halo over top of it! I’m depending on your imagination to help me out here.

So there you have it. The so-called rules. Yet we all have seen these rules blatantly broken in published works by best-selling authors. So why not by us? Are you a rule-breaker? If so, which ones and why? I’m a said girl and I crack up every time I read an animal-sound speaker attribution—but that’s just me. Maybe your story is set in a zoo, and that’s okay too!

* * *

Thanks, Tracy!!

RU CREW, what do you do to keep your dialogue fresh? Do you have any dialogue quirks?

Please join us again on Monday for C.J. Redwine’s latest query letter critique.

Tracy’s Bio:

Tracy March writes about ethical dilemmas in unethical times. As a former pharmaceutical sales executive, Tracy draws inspiration from her experiences and encounters in the medical field and her love/hate relationship with politics.

Tracy is a member of International Thriller Writers, a contributing editor to The Big Thrill webzine, and a member of ITW Debut Authors Program Social Media Team. She is also a member of Romance Writers of America.

Tracy’s debut thriller, Girl Three, set in Washington, D.C., will be released in June 2011. Girl Three placed in several contests in 2010 including First Place in Chicago-North RWA Chapter’s Fire and Ice Contest, First Place in Valley Forge RWA Chapter’s Sheila Contest, and Second Place in Orange County RWA Chapter’s Orange Rose Contest.

Tracy lives in Yorktown, Virginia, with her superhero husband who works for NASA. They recently experienced two years living in Washington, D.C, where they discovered enough drama to inspire a lifetime of stories. Visit Tracy at www.TracyMarch.com.

It’s my pleasure to invite Beth Daniels, who writes as Beth Henderson and J.B. Dane, to visit today.  I read about Beth teaching a class on steampunk, a genre of romance and mystery that fascinated me and was thrilled when she agreed to share what she knows with RU readers.  Whether you’re just curious about the genre, want to write in the genre or want to read more about it, this blog’s for you!

Beginning to feel like everywhere you turn you’re hearing the term Steampunk? It certainly appears to be the case.

If you watch CASTLE on Monday nights on TV, you were treated to an episode last Fall where the victim was killed with a 200 year old ball – not a bullet, a ball – that it appeared had been fired from a dueling pistol. The victim was dressed in Victorian style clothing and once the trail lead to a particular club in Manhattan, Rick Castle began spouting information about how Steampunk was a society of like minded individuals who liked socializing in a 19th century sort of way. A get away experience since most were involved in super geek type “real life” jobs.

If you go looking for information on the Internet, you might come up with a designation that I particularly liked, although it didn’t fit me personally: “Steampunk is what happens when Goths discover the color brown.” I always liked brown.

Actually, Steampunk is that as well as what Rick Castle said. It’s a lot of things and you’ll find all those things, many of them for sale, at a Steampunk convention because Steampunkers like getting together and donning their alternative personas just as much as Renaissance Faire (or STAR TREK and STAR WARS) folk do. A web search will supply at least eleven Steampunk gatherings around the US (San Jose, San Diego, Seattle, Tucson, Denver, Wichita, Philadelphia, Waltham, Massachusetts, Santa Clara, Roanoke, Virginia, and Oklahoma City). Some cities have Steampunk communities (Seattle’s Steam Rats, San Francisco’s Bay Area Steampunk Association, Sacramento’s Steampunk Society, and Philadelphia’s Dorian’s Parlor could well be just the tip of the steamburg).

But what we’re most interested in here is that Steampunk is a market for readers and thus for writers.

I must admit that I discovered Steampunk through an article in RT. A year later I presented my first workshop on Steampunk. Since then I’ve needed to create other Steampunk workshops and slip it into the Alternative History workshop because so many participants were interested in it. This is slowing down production on my own Steampunk tales…yes, I have more than one in progress, but that’s because I like more than one style of Steampunk.

Reading Steampunk equates to a part-time job because new titles are surfacing at a rapid rate. Steampunk is a subgenre of a subgenre in Fantasy, because it is alternative history. But saying that’s all it is is like claiming Urban Fantasy is just another name for a book with vampires in it.

Steampunk does the same thing that Urban Fantasy does, only with an emphasis on taking the steam-driven past and incorporating some more modern marvels – things like computers and regular air travel and robots – all steam powered, of course. It can add doses of time travel, magic, paranormals (vampires, werewolves, golems and ghosts are always popular), mystery, and then wrap it all up in an action-adventure.

Steampunk can take place in London or the British countryside under Victoria. It can run amuck in the American West (a subgenre of the subgenre of the subgenre, if you will, known as Weird West). It can cross dimensions, enter into alternate universes, visit other Earths, as long as the mechanisms in these various and sundry places is either powered by steam or leans toward Victorian mores, it’s Steampunk. Heck, if it does that, Steampunk can even be set in the future.

One thing that you need to do if the inclination to investigate Steampunk hits you is read, read, read, in the genre. There are so many different styles of Steampunk to choose from, narrowing in on one to make your own can be daunting – at first.

Steampunk can lean more toward the horror realm, as China Mieville’s novels do. It can be rather erotic, whether you’re going for Steampunk erotica (most turning up as e-books, some looking decidedly self-published) or an adventure with touches of erotica worked in, such as THE GLASS BOOKS OF THE DREAM EATERS.

Looking for romance where the steam isn’t necessarily describing the temperature of what’s happening in the bedroom? Katie MacAlister flung her 21 century scientist hero into a parallel Steam universe and the arms of a female airship captain in her romantic adventure STEAMED. For a delightful excess of humor with a plethora of paranormal characters engaged in running the British Empire for the Queen, you really shouldn’t miss Gail Carriger’s Parasol Protectorate series, of which I believe the 4th book is about to be released.

If you work better having a visual concept of something, look to the movies and TV. Flix with Steampunk elements are SHERLOCK HOLMES, THE PRESTIGE, VAN HELSING, THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN, THE WILD, WILD WEST, TIME AFTER TIME, THE TIME MACHINE, and even to some extent THE BROTHERS GRIMM. The small screen has supplied THE WILD, WILD WEST (no echo, but the original series in the 1960s, I believe), BRISCO COUNTRY JR. and the difficult to find and also quite extinct series THE FURTHER ADVENTURES OF JULES VERNE. Many DOCTOR WHO episodes lean toward Steampunk.

There are also quite a number of Steampunk graphic novels…series, even! In fact, this is the market that fueled the new enthusiasm for the genre…no, subgenre of a subg…well, you know.

Someone interested in writing Steampunk should be interested in history, particularly that of the Industrial Age, the 19th century. Themes deal with expansion, with invention, and frequently with taking over the world (isn’t that what the British were doing with their Empire?) for political, economic or just plain selfish reasons. It’s the manifest destiny of Steampunk characters. Their ancestors appeared in the tomes of Jules Verne, H.G. Wells, Rider Haggard, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Conan Doyle’s Professor Challenger tales of the Lost World, in Oscar Wilde’s DORIAN GRAY and Robert Louis Stevenson’s DR JECKLE AND MR HYDE. Let’s not forget Bram Stoker’s DRACULA or Mary Shelley’s FRANKENSTEIN…yes, even a tale penned during the Regency (or a story set in the Regency) qualifies. It’s the Industrial Age.

But the writer considering writing Steampunk should also enjoy warping things – like history.

Beth Daniels
aka Beth Henderson, J.B. Dane
www.RomanceAndMystery.com

***

RU Crew, do you have any burning reader questions for Beth? For our writers out there, have you branched out into steampunk? If so, what challenges did you face?

Join us Monday when Romance University founder Adrienne Giordano shares what she has learned in the first months since signing her contract.

***

Bio:  Beth Daniels currently writes as Beth Henderson and J.B. Dane, though she answered to Lisa Dane and Beth Cruise in the past as well. She has worked with editors at Berkley, Zebra, Leisure, Harlequin/Silhouette, and Simon and Schuster’s Aladdin Paperbacks, done e-books for a now defunct company (not her fault, she says), and began her writing life with hardcover books slated for library use with a publisher that got out of the romance business (again, not her fault). More recently she’s had a number of articles about writing picked up by e-zines, saw a short story published in a mystery and suspense magazine that turned up its toes the next year (really, really not her fault), and has a story in the MOTHER GOOSE IS DEAD anthology slated for publication by Dragon Moon Press in 2011.

For over a dozen years Beth taught college level composition, both in the classroom and online, and a credit course on Novel Writing.

Twenty-six of Beth’s manuscripts have appeared in print or e-book format, and in 12 different languages in over 20 countries. At the moment she is working on various manuscripts, some fiction, some non-fiction but related to writing. Her current fairly consuming project is a little thing she calls WRITING STEAMPUNK!

She is a member of Romance Writers of America, and an active member and volunteer with the Kiss of Death Online romantic suspense chapter, and a fixture at SavvyAuthors.com.

Website: www.RomanceAndMystery.com

If you saw yesterday’s wonderful post – and who didn’t? – you’re going to LOVE our workshop today! Toni will be stopping by throughout the day to answer questions about POV and comment on your snippets. Only 2-3 lines please! Get out your masterpieces and let Toni have a look-see. =)

***

Join us on Monday when Jennifer Tanner talks shop about her favorite writing workshops.

***

Bio: Toni McGee Causey is the author of the critically acclaimed and nationally bestselling “Bobbie Faye” novels—an action/caper series set in south Louisiana; the series was released last summer in back-to-back publications, beginning with CHARMED AND DANGEROUS, GIRLS JUST WANNA HAVE GUNS, and WHEN A MAN LOVES A WEAPON. While pursuing an MFA in Screenwriting, Toni had scripts optioned by prominent studios and, just this year, produced an indie film, LA-308, which now has offers of distribution pending. Toni began her career by writing non-fiction for local newspapers, edited Baton Rouge Magazine, and sold articles to places like Redbook and Mademoiselle. She was recently a contributor to the anthology Do You Know What It Means To Miss New Orleans, as well as Killer Year: Stories to Die For. She has had several of her blogs syndicated nationally from the group blog, “Murderati,” and she can also be found at “Murder She Writes.”

It’s a sad fact: you—a writer—have very little time to grab a reader and do it so well, they’re compelled to keep reading. You might have as much as five pages for that first reader (the agent, or the editor), but it’s even more brutal in a bookstore. Most readers who browse, who get enticed enough to pick up the book (as a result of the title / name / or cover which pulls them in) and read the back copy (often not written by the writer) don’t even bother to open the book—their mind is often made up based on things outside the author’s control. Few authors can mandate what their covers look like, and few have title approval. A higher percentage contributes to the back cover copy, but that’s still edited to fit the space and often tweaked by people in marketing who’ve never even read the book. The one thing a writer does control is the writing, and if a browser bothers to pick up the book in the bookstore or click on an excerpt on the web, then you, as the author, have precious little time to grab their attention.

One of the first tools we have at our disposal is POV: point of view. Now, that might seem obvious, and it might seem like a surface choice. Do you write in first person? Or third? Close third or more distant third? Omniscient? Or maybe even second person? (Please don’t.) (Just my personal bugaboo.)

Those are weighty decisions that affect almost everything else you will do in the book. There are pros and cons to each, when you’re considering your story. (We’ll talk about those in a moment.) But there’s another entire facet to POV that a lot of people fail to utilize to the potential they have at hand, and that is that POV also stands for persistence of vision. In pure physiological terms, persistence of vision is defined as:

“The phenomenon where the retina retains an image for a brief split-second after the image was actually seen, and lends itself to animation by fostering the illusion of motion when we view images in closely-timed sequence to one another. We don’t notice the fractional skips between images because that persistence fills in the momentary gap to make the motion seem seamless.”

Now, technically, that specific theory is a little outdated (they have proven there are other physiological mechanisms at work to help our eye understand film as it progresses frame-by-frame), but we don’t need all of that for our purposes here. Just keep in mind the fact that there is a tendency of the eye—or our inner perceptual ability—to hang onto images in sequence which then builds a larger image, an impression of movement, an impression of reality.

This is how we build characters: image by image until we have created a series of images associated with that character. The images we choose to utilize when showing that character need, therefore, to be consistent with that character’s point of view, and that’s going to be affected by that character’s background, job, economic situation, personal histories, health, etc. – the soul of the character needs to bleed through every word choice you make while in their point of view.

Here’s what I mean by that: whether you’ve chosen first, second, third or omniscient point of view, you have to show us the character, without always telling us about the character. One of the things I see many writers—even long established writers—do that is robbing their work of impact is that they tell me a great deal about the characters as the characters show up in the scene. What that does is inform me intellectually—but it doesn’t bring the person alive, doesn’t make them feel real. If they had utilized point of view carefully, however, they could have shown me things about the character that only that character in that book would have seen in that particular way, which makes that character real. It’s a combination of point of view (whether it’s 1st, 3rd, etc.) and “persistence of vision” – how that character sees what they see and how they interpret what they’re seeing. No two characters in any book should see the world in the same exact way. None of us do in real life.

I’ll give you a couple of examples. Let’s say that there’s a small bistro in the neighborhood: worn black and white square tiles, old mahogany bar, small tables with red checkered table cloths crowded as close together as possible, vases on the tables of real flowers, probably droopy white daisies, something affordable. Every table has the typical salt/pepper shakers, ketchup, Parmesan cheese, packets of sweetener for the tea that most people order there. There are a few patrons scattered about, a bartender whose seen better days, and overhead lighting that doesn’t seem to be making much of an effort.

Okay, let’s stop there for a moment. You probably were able to see the place, because I gave you enough visual cues to lead your eye. What I also did was give you cues in the same approximate order that you would normally take in on your own, if you should walk through that door. That’s important, that order. You’ll do yourself a major favor if you think about specific powerful details as you enter the room. Ask yourself, what’s the impact point? What’s the first thing the eye grabs? It’s usually color (black and white worn checkered floor, mahogany bar, white daisies, ketchup bottles, etc.). Next, it’s lighting and space—does the space seem crowded, spacious, etc., and what is the quality of the lighting.

And even so, we’ve only done maybe half the job that we could do for that space. Because right now, you have no idea who’s seeing that space. It’s a generic description. It’s visual, sure, but when you don’t have much space to grab your reader, you’ve got to give them much more than just visual. You’ve got to give them character and attitude, too.

Here’s where I tell you the warning of how many manuscripts and scripts—when I was a screenwriter—that I read where I got several pages into a story that had lush description, and several pages in, I still did not know more about that character who was in those scenes than I did when I started the manuscript. If I can get several pages into your story and not know your character? You have failed. That’s harsh, but it’s the truth. Do not waste my time, as a reader. Do not fritter away your opportunity describing crap for the sake of “setting the scene.” Setting the scene is a waste of time if you don’t clue me in to who you’re setting the scene for / with. Whose point of view it is. Give me attitude, give me character in what they’re choosing to share with me, and you’ll pique my interest.

So let’s go back to that bistro and think about that setting. Let’s say that your main character is a cop, walking into that scene. A cop is going to see that bistro much differently than a down-and-out-of-work twenty-year-old who’s been on the grift, looking for a little cash-under-the-table job. A cop’s point of view—whether you utilize the mechanics of first person or third or omniscient—his point of view, his “vision” is going to have a specific kind of attitude, a wariness, an assessment, that is different from any other character walking into that same bistro.

We’ll use first person here. (First person is generally used when you want the reader to very closely identify with the character and not have any ability to know more than what the character knows in that moment. It’s typical of first person stories to be told through the point of view of the main character for the length of the work, but there are exceptions—a narrator, for example, or multiple first-person characters, where the POVs switch between characters, usually with each subsequent chapter.) Here the example:

I hated that damned bell on the door; every eye in the place turned toward me when I entered, and it felt like a target painted dead center mass for the few seconds it took me to move through the door, through the thick greasy smell of fried bacon and stale beer, across the scuffed checkerboard tile, to a table in the back where I could look out over the place. The lighting was crap—like it had given up trying last century and nobody bothered to notice. It made everything I had to do here tonight that much harder. Didn’t help that I couldn’t wear my vest here, and here is where I’d most likely get shot. Fucked, that’s what that was.
Murray was hunched behind the bar as usual, working a rag on some invisible spot on the bar, hardly listening to some grifter kid try his spiel about how much he needed work while he was surreptitiously trying to lift the wallet of the old man sitting next to him, just below Murray’s line of sight. I gave Murray a nod and eyeballed the kid—let him stop the idiot. I sure as hell wasn’t blowing my cover for petty theft.
The chair wobbled—this was the worst of the rickety tables. There were two college girls at my favorite spot, the one closest to the easiest exit; they were wailing about boyfriends who done them wrong, each looking to try to top the other one. I could tell ’em each that they were going to keep gettin’ crap from guys if they hung out at shitholes like this. We were three-and-a-half blocks into hell-and-gone cheap-ass territory, barely on the outskirts of ghetto. I could’ve told ’em to go over to Charlie’s, over on sixth. They had better food, better beer, slightly better idiots willing to fork over dough for the pleasure of listening to them whine. Didn’t bother though. Girls like that never learn.
As soon as I’d walked in, I’d counted seven people in the room besides me: Murray, the kid, the old man, the two girls made five. I hated the way the tables crowded together, stained tablecloths barely cleaned from previous patrons. It made moving fast, getting to my gun, just that much more of a hassle. I hated hassle. I hated a lot of things, but I really fucking hated hassle. I’d discounted the five I already mentioned as soon as I saw ’em. That meant that one of the two people left was the asshole I was looking for, the perp trying to hire a hit-man to solve a problem. I was the hit-man. Or at least, that was my role tonight. I looked it. Smelled like it—smelled like six days of booze and cigarettes crammed into one. Well, that’s how I usually looked and smelled. Probably why the sarge wanted me for the job.
Of the two people left in the room, the lady near the front window was a contender, but not likely—she just looked too worn out to give a good damn about having anyone killed. I pegged her as a cleaning lady, coming off a rough night, too tired to do much more than scrape at her burned toast and runny eggs. She had dust on her gray sweater and smudges on her too-thin face and gray eyes that looked beaten. That left the shiny happy broad over in the opposite corner. The redhead who kept reapplying her lipstick, using her mirror to scope out the room. She wasn’t completely dim, then. That’s a problem. I don’t mind stupid criminals. It’s when they’re stupid-but-think-they’re clever that someone usually gets hurt.
Lately, that someone had been me. I was battin’ a thousand in shitty luck, and tonight, I had a bad feeling.
One day, I’m gonna learn to listen to that.

Okay, not that that’s great, but I wanted to show you how that set up does several things in 645 words and what you “get” about that room is now significantly different than the generic version: 1) we know that room is being described by a very specific person with a very specific attitude, and (2) we know he’s a cop—though he never actually tells us and (3) we know he’s weighing and measuring everyone in the room, and how the room is laid out, (4) who might be carrying a weapon, (5) that he was in danger and knew it and (6) that he was going to do his job anyway. At the same time, you’ve gotten enough details to see the scene (the bistro)—and it’s the same details as what I described earlier, but it’s told with his very specific perception / attitude. That cop would count the people when he walked in, would assess the threat level, would look for ways to place himself in a position of retreat, should he need it, etc. Other patrons might not notice anything like that. Without actually telling you his attitude (I never said “he has a pessimistic attitude”), I showed it through his slant on what he saw, and how he perceived those things around him. That attitude has to be consistent throughout. Every time we’re in his point of view, we should have his persistence of vision—his specific way of seeing the world—which does more to characterize him than all of the descriptive modifiers any author could attach to him.

Let’s look at the same scene told through one of the other patron’s eyes. This time, I’ll use third person. (Third person is generally used when the author wants to convey a little bit more about the scene than a character might convey in the strict sense of “telling” the story. If an author wants the reader to know more than the protagonist knows, the author can switch to other characters’ POV—generally done now in their own sections or their own chapters—which can reveal information that creates stress for the reader, because they know more about the danger the protagonist is in than the protagonist does—yet. And the reader feels tension as the protagonist catches up to that realization.) Now, I’m purposefully not doing dialog or action here, just a section of description to show point of view. Here ya go:

It was a quaint place, as places go, for hiring a killer. She hadn’t expected it to even have tablecloths, or actual silverware. She’d done a little bit of research before agreeing to meet with the killer-for-hire here: rundown little bistro out on the edge of civility, struggling to survive in this economy. She felt for the place, really. She knew what it was to be struggling on the edge, barely able to make ends meet, trying to figure out a solution.
They’d done a fairly decent job, here: there were daisies in the vases on the tables. Sure, the vases were cheap—the kind you’d get at Wal-Mart, maybe, but there was nothing wrong with Wal-Mart. She didn’t know why people always said Wal-Mart with their noses in the air, like they were too good for the place. She bet every one of those people secretly shopped there and didn’t want to admit they were the same as regular, normal people. She just really didn’t understand people like that. Staring down their noses at perfectly good vases, for example, acting all high and mighty. People like that? Were no good. No good at all. She wanted to give them a piece of her mind, sometimes, and she bit back the words. It didn’t make for a good alibi to be the kind of person who stuck out in people’s memory as having been angry. No, no, she’d just bide her time. Her time would come.
But she liked the little white daisies. Real flowers instead of plastic. They were trying hard to be pleasing. The whole place was, really, like that waitress in the kitchen who’d looked harried, who’d worked hard to keep the tables bussed and the orders coming out quickly, who’d been crying her eyes out over something bad that had happened this past week, she’d said, as she apologized for sobbing over her order. She had wanted to soothe the girl, to empathize. Empathizing, though, made you memorable. She knew better than to be memorable.
She’d been waiting for the killer for the last hour, coming in early to get a feel for the customers—which ones were the regulars (the old guy at the bar looked like he’d grown there since the fifties… she was actually surprised when he was able to stand to go to the restroom)… and the not-so-regulars… the hussy who kept applying her lipstick, checking out the room. Probably some floozy, waiting for some woman’s husband to come along, checking out all of the angles, making sure the wife wasn’t hanging around in the shadows, about to catch them. She was probably someone in the process of breaking up a home, that hussy.
She was in the middle of thinking about changing her hired-killer order to a two-fer when the skeevy guy came in, creeping across the room like some sort of nasty beetle, his eyes shifting around, taking everything in, looking at her, passing her over as just another fixture. It was probably the dust on her sweater, the smudges on her face, the sturdy cleaning-lady shoes that had done it. It was what she’d intended, to be forgettable. Still, it rankled. She’d apparently been forgettable to Harry, too, with him cheating on her with another hussy, just like that one over there in the corner.
The skeevy guy was reflected in the big picture window, since it was dark outside. She watched him without being obvious about it, and he looked tense. He checked out everyone in the place, over and over, waiting. Nodded to the bartender about something she couldn’t see. She thought maybe he was the killer-for-hire, but there was something odd about him. Something a little too TV-villain perfect, and little warning bells went off in her head. Maybe he was a cop.
He was already making his way over to the hussy, and she watched, eating her bad eggs—they really could do a lot better in this place with a decent cook—and the skeevy guy asked the girl, “So, you looking for me?”
The girl screamed, then, and jumped up and did the damndest thing: she shot the guy. Twice. And then ran.

Okay, that’s 701 words, and we have an entirely different POV: we’re in third person, and specifically getting that person’s attitudes about life, about her surroundings, about the people there, the details that she would notice that the cop wouldn’t. We’re seeing her point of view as well as her persistence of vision: her take on that world. Nowhere does she tell us what she does for a living (but we get the details). Nowhere do I give you her slant on life, but you can tell it’s a bit schizophrenic—empathizes with the place, loves the daisies, but is obviously contemplating killing not just Harry, her husband, but some random woman who she feels is a hussy. We know a great deal about that woman just from what we see through her vision. How she sees her world and the details she picks out matter. They’re tools for you to use.

We could keep going with the other characters, playing with other forms of point of view. Omniscient has the advantage of giving us a lot more information than the protagonist usually has, and as such, can sometimes create a lot of tension (we see the bomb beneath their seat that they have no clue is there)… but it can also leave us feeling a bit detached, emotionally, from the characters if not handled very carefully. There’s also the risk of losing or confusing the reader with too much head-hopping (moving back and forth between character’s POVs)—which you can do in omniscient, but it is a real risk, and the reader has to be carefully led (the segues better be fabulous).

The pros and cons of the mechanics of point of view—which one you choose to use—have to be weighed carefully. If you want us to be in the shoes of the protagonist, then we can’t know more than he or she knows, and that in and of itself can create a lot of obstacles. One, for example, would be: how do you show important stuff that he needs to see which is a clue, but not have him pick up on the clue right now (which might mean he either looks dumb or he’d figure it out too soon and oops, the story is over). This issue definitely applies to first person, but can apply to third person, if the only point of view in the book is that one person.

The drawback to third person is that you have the ability to show some of the things the character doesn’t quite pick up on, but you run the risk of the reader being too far out ahead of the character and getting frustrated with the story as the character catches up.

The pros to using omniscient is, of course, scope: big epics, S/F/F (where there’s a tremendous amount of world-building), and period pieces can truly benefit from omniscient. The pros to first person is that immediacy of emotion / reaction—the reader tends to more closely identify with the character. The benefit of third is that you have some of the advantages of first (that close identification with the character), but you have a bit more ease in switching into another character’s point of view (and I’d generally recommend doing that with a section break or a chapter break when you make the switch, just to keep the voices of each character clear). The disadvantage to multiple point of view characters (third person or omniscient) is that, if you’re doing your job right, you’re creating different voices (styles of thinking/speaking/seeing the world) for each character. (This is not to be confused with “voice” of the overall project. That’s a different subject for a different day.) If you’re utilizing POV well—giving us the attitudes and details that only that character could give us, then when you switch into another character’s point of view, we should be able to tell it just from what they relate to us and how they are seeing their world.

***

Toni will be taking questions on POV today, but tomorrow, stop on in when she takes examples of your work in a special POV workshop! Don’t forget to comment today – Toni’s giving away THREE $25 gift certificates to the bookstore of your choice to lucky commenters!

Join us tomorrow when Toni takes examples of your work and offers advice – a genuine workshop only here – on Romance University!

***

Bio: Toni McGee Causey is the author of the critically acclaimed and nationally bestselling “Bobbie Faye” novels—an action/caper series set in south Louisiana; the series was released last summer in back-to-back publications, beginning with CHARMED AND DANGEROUS, GIRLS JUST WANNA HAVE GUNS, and WHEN A MAN LOVES A WEAPON. While pursuing an MFA in Screenwriting, Toni had scripts optioned by prominent studios and, just this year, produced an indie film, LA-308, which now has offers of distribution pending. Toni began her career by writing non-fiction for local newspapers, edited Baton Rouge Magazine, and sold articles to places like Redbook and Mademoiselle. She was recently a contributor to the anthology Do You Know What It Means To Miss New Orleans, as well as Killer Year: Stories to Die For. She has had several of her blogs syndicated nationally from the group blog, “Murderati,” and she can also be found at “Murder She Writes.”

• White or wheat? -  Ten years ago I would have said white, but as with all things, my tastes have matured. I prefer wheat, 9-grains and other breads with texture and flavor.  The white is almost too sweet. But give me hot, fresh french bread and I am definitely in heaven.
• Dog or cat? Yes!  Throw in horses and ferrets too. I love all animals. I’ve had cats all my life, in fact, my 25 year old just passed away this year and I am going to miss him terribly. My oldest dog will be 15 in June.  I am a total sucker for strays — animals and people alike.
• Drive or fly? I love road trips, grew up traveling all over the country in my grandmother’s station wagon.  This year I took four road trips – one to Washington D.C.,  one to Colorado (where I got to meet Tracey and Adrienne!) and two to Orlando.  Yes, two to Orlando!  Drove with my BFF writer friends to Orlando for the RWA National Convention and two months later went back with my family for our annual Disney retreat.  I actually prefer driving to flying, but it all depends on the time that I have.  And yes, I have road trips planned for next year already!
• PBJ or Tuna? Tuna. 100% tuna.  We went through a poor period when I was a kid and I ate PBJ for breakfast, lunch and dinner for two years (no exaggeration) and filled in the blank spots with Ramen Noodles.  I can’t even take the smell of PBJ anymore.
• Leather or lace? Leather.  Lace itches. ‘Nuff said.
• Mountains or beach? Hmmm — mountains are mysterious and powerful and covered with powder and all kinds of nature.  But beaches are sandy, warm and inviting with the ocean spread out in front of you.  Mountains.  Definitely mountains.
• Paperback or hardback? Dude — it’s a book.  I’ll read it hardback, paperback or e-back — I just love to read.
• Flip flops or tennis shoes? Sneakers are for walking/working/working out.  Flip flops or bare foot everywhere else.
• Pen or pencil? Gel pens.  I love them.
• Mac or PC? Oddly enough, I have always been a PC girl until six months ago. I got my Mac and it’s definitely made me a total convert.
• Coffee or tea? Tea.   I know my passion for Starbuck’s is well-documented, but I was drinking hot tea in a bottle when I was growing up.
• Night owl or early riser? Early riser.  I go to bed at old lady hours — like 9.
• Coke or Pepsi? Coke.  If I have to drink soda, it’s coke and it has lime in it.  Started doing that after a trip to Puerto Rico years ago and then loved it when they started selling it canned that way.
• City or country? Hmmm — country.  I like the open feel of nature around me and after spending a few years on a horse farm, I know where I want to retire.
• Cat Woman or Wonder Woman? Oh, see that’s not fair. I’m a total comic book geek.  Wonder Woman has the Greek myth cachet going for her, but Catwoman was wildly sexy, dangerous and just the right bit of naughty for Bats.
• Superman or Batman? Bats.  Bruce Wayne was his alter-ego and he made himself into a hero.
• Email or Text? Text. I live on my iPhone.
• Summer or winter? In Virginia, I loved Spring and Autumn, in Texas, I am all about the Winter. I cannot stand parboil in the summer.
• Cheetos or Doritos? Not a fan of either, sadly enough. I’ll eat them, but I would much rather have fresh veggies.
• Lays or Ruffles? See above.
• Rock ‘n Roll or classical? Classical.  John Williams converted me to the power of the symphony when I was but five years old.
• Sunny side up or scrambled? Over-medium or egg-in-toast!
• Milk chocolate or dark chocolate? Dark chocolate all the way.  Milk is too sweet and dark is just the right amount of dark kick.
• Jeans or khakis? Jeans.  I like them well-worn and comfy — if I have to get out of my cotton stretches or jammies!
• Baseball or football? Um? C — none of the above?

* * *

So RU Crew, what do you think? Did Heather strike any sparks? If you enjoy her random babble, you can keep up with her at her Daily Dose blog!

Be sure to drop by Monday when Urban Fantasy writer C.J. Redwine kicks off 2011 right with an installment of our ever-popular Query Writing 101.

Heather’s Bio:

Heather Long lives in North Texas with her husband, daughter and their menagerie of animals. As a child, Heather skipped picture books and enjoyed the Harlequin romance novels by Penny Jordan and Nora Roberts that her grandmother read to her. Heather believes that laughter is as important to life as breathing and that the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus are very real. In the meanwhile, she is hard at work on her next novel.  You can check out her site at http://www.heatherlong.net.

Since moving to California, I’m often asked where I’m from because they know it sure as heck ain’t from around here! I love being a southern gal, and have a soft spot for other women with the same kind of drawl and mindset. I was fortunate enough to meet and chat with (and understand!) author Liz Talley at National in Orlando last summer. Liz lives in Louisiana, but writes fabulous stories set in the area close to my Texas hometown. Today, Liz is going to share some tips on how to infuse your writing with more emotion, which is always a good thing for engaging your readers! Liz has generously offered to give away Vegas Two Step and a $10.00 gift card for Barnes and Noble or BAM.

Howdy, Liz!

I’m going to be absolutely up front and honest with you, I’m not great at teaching craft. I know. You’re wondering what I’m doing here and why you are even bothering to read any further. I don’t have a good answer for that, but I’m going to do my absolute best to give you some tools for layering emotion into your manuscript, mainly tone, mood, theme and dialogue.

First, let’s talk TONE. Before you can create the exact emotion you want to evoke in a scene, you need to think about what tone you’re trying to establish. Tone is the writer’s attitude toward his or her audience and subject. Is your tone playful? Formal? Sarcastic? Melancholy? What do you bring to the scene? Part of tone is the author’s voice. It’s how you say what you intend to say. Discovering the tone you wish to take is important to the dynamics of the scene. For example, if you are writing a scene where the heroine is talking to her best friend about being betrayed by her first love, your tone may be sympathetic. But it could be bitter. Can you write the same scene but take different tones? Of course you can. Establishing your tone is the first step in creating emotion.

Now let’s look at MOOD. How is mood different you say? Well, it’s different in that mood is the emotion you wish to create in your reader. It’s the transfer of your tone to the reader. The mood is often suggested by the details you insert into your scene. Take the very first scene of your current work in progress. What feeling are you trying to create in the reader – regret, fear, outrage? What elements do you use other than your dialogue to portray this feeling? Examine your characters’ movements, expressions, even setting. How do these elements contribute to the mood you are trying to create in your reader? Can you stretch yourself to make those elements more effective in creating the feeling you want your reader to take with him/her?

Next, comes a slightly more complex tool for creating emotion, but it’s probably my favorite – it’s the weaving of THEME throughout the book. The definition of theme is “what the work is trying to say about the nature of people or life[1]”. When starting a book, I always stop to ponder my theme for the book, and then make sure I subtlety weave this underlying thought throughout my story. One of my favorite methods is the use of a symbol. In my upcoming January book A Little Texas, my heroine Kate must come face to face with a past she’d rather forget. Hurt long ago by her father, she’s spent much of her life protecting herself and not letting anyone get close enough to hurt or humiliate her. My symbol in this story is a plant. Kate starts the story as a hard, bitter seed. Throughout the book (which starts in winter) I weave imagery associated with plants. It’s very subtle, but also very intentional. By the end of the story, Kate has been watered, tenderly-loved and allowed to grow through forgiveness. The symbols at the end of the book are lush and spring-like, reflecting a rebirth. It’s similar to creating flow in your house. Many designers use one particular color that flows from room to room to unite the house. Do you automatically notice? Probably not. But the theme is there if one looks hard enough.

The final way you can enrich the emotion in your story is through realistic, heartfelt DIALOGUE. And there is only one way to do this – climb into the story. Don’t write the scene. Live the scene. I’m a visual learner so this is a must for me. I have to be there in the scene. I have to hear the words the characters speak and their words must be authentic… which means I don’t think about rules. When you’re in a scene, don’t stop to ponder the “correctness” of the words or whether it will fit the line. When writing highly-charged emotional scenes, let your characters live the scene. What comes out of their mouths may shock you. That’s good. Roll with it. Allow them to come to life and speak their minds. Let them feel the anger, pain, betrayal, frustration, desire, need, joy, etc. Ride the roller coaster you put them on, taking time to pull from your own life the times when you felt the way your character feels. Put your emotions from that time in your manuscript. Raw and uncensored is some of the best writing you can do.

So there you have it – four things to examine more closely when layering emotion into your story. As I wrote this, it occurred to me that the story I’m currently working on might be lacking some of these elements, so the topic is very timely for me. We all struggle with revising and polishing our work, but I think layering emotion is one of the most important techniques you can use in your writer’s tool box. Think about the writers atop the NYT Bestseller’s lists. What do they all have in common? Yes, emotion. Their stories and characters pull at you, make you identify with them, and keep you coming back for more. Learn to do this, and you just might join them on that list.

***

RU Crew, we’ve all read those books that put us through the wringer, right? Take this opportunity to pick Liz’s brain about how you can write one of those emotion-filled stories of your own. And share those books that really did it for you. (Mine’s an SEP book that I’ll reveal in the comments ) Don’t forget Liz will give away a book and a $10 gift card!

Don’t miss Monday’s lecture when author Lori Brighton will be here to talk about the art of self-publishing.

Liz Talley writes sassy Southern stories for Harlequin Superromance. Her book Vegas Two Step debuted in June 2010 and her next book The Way to Texas hits shelves on December 7^th with A Little Texas to follow on January 11^th. Currently, she’s hard at work on book number five while juggling a move across town, buying presents to go under a non-existent Christmas tree and trying to remember to pack her children lunch every morning. You can visit her at www.liztalleybooks.com to learn more about her and her upcoming books.