If you are a writer, you have five magic words: I am writing a book.

These simple words (or variations of them) can be used to do a variety of tricks:

Research. If you need research for your novel or your nonfiction words, you need help from experts. The Magic Words often open doors and encourages people to share resources, facts and time with you. You might think that people won’t want to share because THEY want to write about it. But most of the time, experts are experts in their field, but not in writing. Mention their names and they are happy to help.

Teaching. Unfortunately, the majority of writers don’t make a living with their writing. Instead, they need to supplement and teaching is a traditional way to do that. I do not have an English or Writing degree; my B.A. is in Speech Pathology and my M.A. is in Audiology (testing hearing). But I taught Freshman Composition for seven years. How did I get that job? Four magic words: I wrote this book.

Speaking or Platform. Another way to bring in extra income is by speaking. A book, even a fiction title, gives you a “platform,” some reason to be known, something to talk about. Speaking engagements are always easier when you can say, “I wrote this book.”

In-Laws. On a personal note, it helps to tell family and friends, “I am writing a book.” Then, when you appear spacey or forget a birthday, well, it’s not your fault, it’s the book’s fault.

Editors/Agents. The key words here are “I have written a book.” Editors and agents usually want a full mss to evaluate.

Use these magic words today and report back–what magic did they work?

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

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Where did July and August go?

Computer Woes. First, my server has been wonky for the last two weeks–apologies. If you have any difficulty getting to pages, please send me an email so I can straighten it out (darcy at darcypattison dot com).

Travel. For me, this summer included a great two-week trip to China. Our friend of ten years was getting engaged and invited us to the engagement party. Wow, what a great trip. So much to see and do–and we did all the usual things. Beijing in July was very smoggy. But we had a couple clear days to climb the Great Wall and see the Forbidden City. My favorite part was wandering the streets, as you’ll see in this video of a street vendor blowing a caramel-sugar pig:

Research (NOT!) After China, I did research (NOT!). My friend, Dori Butler won the Edgar award this year for the best children’s mystery for her series, The Buddy Files. (IF you haven’t read them, you need to!) She’s working on a new mystery–duh! And doing research: she’s recently shot a Taurus 380 and a Glock 22.40.

Why can’t I do cool research, I wondered? So, I went and had my throat slashed. Well, technically, they called it minor surgery as they took out my thyroid. But I now have the personal experience to go with Dori’s to write that mystery thriller. Hmmm. Maybe I don’t like research so much.

Back to Normal. But all it well here in the mid-South. And I’m back in the saddle with lots of plans for fall!

Plans for Fall.

• Random Acts of Publicity: By Wednesday, I’ll have the complete info posted on this fun week when it’s “All About Your Friend’s Book.”
• And I’m planning a September series on the Writer’s Voice.

So, how was YOUR summer? Any interesting trips, research, writing? Please share your good news!

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Searching for Plot Events

I’m evaluating the outline for my WIP novel and realize that I need more events. It takes place at one big event that spans 98 hours. Within that time period, though, I need some exciting things happening. I’ve sorta mapped out the emotional changes (Wow, what a change for me!), but now it’s the events themselves that matter.

In Roz Morris’ Nail Your Novel book, (a great book to use when writing your first draft!) she suggests that you use a box and just throw in ideas. The ideas can come from brainstorming or from research about a topic. Don’t worry about where the bit of action goes in the story, just write it on a card and throw it into the mix.
When the box is full, or when you’ve done enough research, then you can sort through ideas and evaluate if they will fit into your novel. You’ll want to toss some of them as unsuitable for your story. The rest, though, you can start to sort and put into a reasonable order.

Because my novel has a tight time line, I’ve done a modification. As shown in the picture here, I’ve created three envelopes. As I’m doing research and brainstorming, I’m slotting events loosely into Act 1, Act 2 or Act 3 of my novel. So, use one big envelope or box or several envelopes based on whatever division works for your novel. For example, you might want to use one envelope for each subplot, or perhaps for each major setting of your novel.

In any event, I’m still trying out voices and still plotting. What stage is your WIP at?

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

I am researching competition for a picture book idea. I know there are topics with very stiff competition and I want to avoid anything similar to what has already been done.

But this time, I am also researching how this particular publisher approaches certain types of books. I want to know if they do double page spreads, spot illustrations or full illustrations, and what kind of language is used. So, I’ve ordered a couple books to study.

When I get the books, I plan to read them quickly for an overall impression. Then, I’ll read aloud to see how the language flows. I’ll study the illustrations to see how much liberty the illustrator has taken with the text; in other words, how much do I have to provide for the illustrator and how much will they interpret.

I’ll also try to think about how I can add something new to the collection of books on a topic. If this topic is covered 20 times in current children’s books, I”ll need to be bolder in order to “stand out in today’s crowded market.” If it’s only covered once, I’ve more leeway, and won’t have to push quite so hard.

Tools for Researching Competition

1. Search. Search both Amazon (or Powells or your favorite online bookstore) and Google (or your favorite general purpose search engine) for books on your topic.
2. Specialized search. Be sure to also search GoogleBooks and any other specialized search engines you know about.
3. Library. Search the catalog of your favorite library to see if they have it available for checking out. Also search WorldCat.org to see what other books are available. (Hint: You can download a WorldCat plugin to put this search on your Firebox browser; there’s also a plug-in for your Facebook page.)

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

When you write a nonfiction picture book, a biography (of any length) or other nonfiction topics, how much do you document? Do you use end notes, foot notes, or what?

Well-Documented Nonfiction Sells a Manuscript

Original Sources. You should use as many original or primary sources as possible. Go back to the original diary, the first photographs, the newspaper account of the time, letters, etc. I’m not talking here about how/where to research, but it’s worth saying that nonfiction for kids relied on original research.

The documentation of primary sources, though, is harder than with published resources. When I taught Freshman Composition, I told my students to put in more information than you think necessary. The main thing that documentation does is to let your reader know how they, too, might access that documentation to check your facts, or to dig deeper. If in doubt about “proper” documentation, look up the MLA or APA formats; my students liked using Easy Bib, an online service that will ask for infomation and return it properly formatted. If you are at a place where you can’t look it up, then record more than you think necessary. If you have found an original diary, then include everything you can about the diary: beginning date, ending date, # of entries, location that the diary was written, name of author, maiden name of women author, birth date and death date if available, and anything else about your access to it that seems important.

Be sure to document everything: written text, photographs, objects, film, recording, websites, multimedia, etc. Everything.

Writing the Manuscript. Make sure that as you write the manuscript, you are noting when and where you draw information from the source. I prefer to keep an ongoing bibliography and then follow the MLA format of adding the author’s last name and page number at the point where the info occurs.

Nonfiction should use original sources for information (Pattison).

Submitting the Manuscript. Ah, here’s where things get tricky. If you’re working with an editor and can ask preferences, do that. Endnote, footnote, in-text citation – it’s a matter of personal preference or house preference and should be followed if you know it.

If you don’t know, then pick one method that seems reasonable, given your topic and your research, and stick with it. Then, in the cover letter, explain what you’ve done. That’s it. Don’t stress out over this or try to go into too much explanation or apologize for the method of presentation. Just be straight forward about what you’ve done and if the publishing house is interested, they can ask you to re-format the revision a different way.

Creative Non-fiction. What if you write creative non-fiction and it reads like fiction and you don’t want those footnotes to interrupt the flow of the story. Then, you have two choices: the least intrusive method of documentation is end notes, where you put a super-numeral at the position the documentation is appropriate and at the end of a chapter or the end of the manuscript, you list the end notes.

OR, you can send in two versions of the manuscript, one with no documentation and one with documentation. That would give the editor the option of which to read and some editors would choose one, some the other.

Basically, do the original research, document the research, document the places in the manuscript where the documentation is used, and format either to an editor/publishing houses specifications, or if that is unknown, then the method that seems most reasonable. Then, submit.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Wisdom, the Midway Albatross

by Darcy Pattison

Giveaway ends March 11, 2012.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win