Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America

Archive for May, 2011

Hunting Down the Value of Social Media

Monday, May 16th, 2011

For April Fool’s this year, I was one of three authors who penned a satirical collection called Paths of Storytelling to celebrate Vampire: the Masquerade’s twentieth anniversary. For most of the day, I was glued to the internet, wondering what reader’s reactions would be.

Coupled with an impromptu squirrel riff off of The Raven, I didn’t get much else accomplished that day or the next – and I was hopping mad about it. I asked myself a few, pointed questions: Did I really need to freak out know what reader’s responses were going to be? How much do I need to engage on social media to promote myself or my books, anyway? Will people buy the projects I write because I wrote them, or because it’s a subject they want to read?

Then, I asked myself that question. That scary, grab-your-keyboard, query to end all queries.

Are Facebook, Twitter and IM having any effect on the quality or volume of my work?

These questions, coupled with a very long list of goals I wanted to accomplish, plagued me like a broken plot. I was already hoping to cut down on my usage of these tools, but the underlying questions caused me to do something I never thought I’d do: I started a one-hundred day sabbatical from all social media from April 4th through July 13th.

Things to Keep in Mind
Before I go any further, there are a few items of import I’d like you to keep in mind. First? I’ve applied the word “introverted” when describing authors in the past. If I ever say that, please understand I do not mean “all writers live in small cabins far removed from civilization and do not shave or wear brightly-colored clothing.” Like playing a solo, writing is an introverted activity. You can be the most social person in the world and still be a writer, but when you do? The words you type are coming from your head — not an alien hive mind. Not yet, anyway.
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Tags: Monica Valentinelli, social media
Posted in Building a Career, Networking and Self-Promotion, SFWA Blog, The Business of Writing | 4 Comments »

Key Conditions for Suspense:
Part 22 – Patterns for the Struggle: Element 1

Saturday, May 14th, 2011

by John D. Brown

The following is part of a continuing series. If you wish to start at the beginning, head to It’s All About The Reader.

In the presentation phase, readers are introduced to the problem. But they want more than a moment of sympathy or worry. They want their hopes and fears for the character to build to a pitch.

How do we do that?

We don’t let the characters solve the problem. Not yet.

So our character forms a goal—solve the problem—identifies the first step to do just that, and takes action. Of course, she won’t solve it with that one action. We’ve talked about this. If she solves it right out of the gate, the story is over. We want reader tension to build, not dissipate. And so she’s going to go around the story cycle a few times trying to solve the problem.

How many times?

There’s NO set number. There are many variations that work. However, I will say that with the central problem you probably need at least three revolutions (some subplots might only require one revolution). First, you need that many to create a story long enough to make it a novel. In fact, you’ll probably need many more. Second, there’s something about three that makes it feel significant, that the character has achieved something. Finally, three seems to be the number that sets a pattern. If someone fails the first two times, we’re likely to think they’ll fail the third. I believe this helps build tension surrounding that third attempt.

So while our hero makes some headway, she also runs into troubles that seem to threaten complete failure. The reader feels the hero has a chance of winning, but the troubles and failures make the odds of her losing seem to grow. Furthermore, the hero begins to run out of time, the stakes (what might be lost) are raised, vague threats become very specific. These are all the problem intensifiers we talked about in the first post in the series, and all of them make the reader’s worry grow.

So what about the structure of this phase? Do you have to follow a strict pattern of “pinch points” and “mid act reversals”?

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Tags: John D. Brown
Posted in Advice for New Writers, Information Center, SFWA Blog, The Craft of Writing, Tips for Beginners, Writing Technique | Comments Off

Quick Updates for 2011-05-14

Saturday, May 14th, 2011

• You can read excerpts from Locus's interview with SFWA member @daviddlevine at http://tinyurl.com/45y737b #
• SFWA member @alcole123 STEN IN HOLLYWOOD: THE NEXT TO THE LAST MISADVENTURE http://tinyurl.com/5wqzfmg #

Tags: twitter
Posted in Excluded Categories | Comments Off

Nebula Awards Weekend: Mass Book Signing

Thursday, May 12th, 2011

Authors will autograph their books at the Nebula Awards Weekend, Friday, May 18, 2012 from 5:30 p.m. until 7:30 p.m. at the Hyatt Regency Crystal City at 2799 Jefferson David Highway, Arlington, VA 22202.  The Hyatt is located nine-tenths of a mile south of the Crystal City Metro Station.  Use the complimentary Hyatt Shuttle bus to get from the Metro Station to the Hyatt.  Valet parking is available at the Hyatt for a fee.

The event is open to the public.

Books by the authors participating in the signing may be purchased throughout the weekend. See below for the tentative hours of The Book Depot.

Please indicate you would like to sign your books during the mass signing when you register for the Nebula Awards Weekend.  Registration will begin January 10th.  If you would like to bring copies of your books for The Book Depot to sell, please contact us.

Tentative hours for The Book Depot are:

Friday 10:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.
Friday 5:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.
Saturday 10:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.
Sunday 10:00 a.m. – Noon

Tags: Nebula Award, Nebula Awards
Posted in Nebula Awards, News, SFWA Blog | Comments Off

Quick Updates for 2011-05-12

Thursday, May 12th, 2011

• @LAGilman The rules for posthumous wins would come into play. #

Tags: twitter
Posted in Excluded Categories | Comments Off

Quick Updates for 2011-05-11

Wednesday, May 11th, 2011

• @katrinaarcher They are doing a voter packet this year. #
• Charles Waverly and the Deadly African Safari by SFWA member Anna D. Allen is now available http://is.gd/YAxmaY #

Tags: twitter
Posted in Excluded Categories | Comments Off

I Broke a News Story, and All I Got Was This Freaking T-Shirt

Tuesday, May 10th, 2011

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

As readers of this blog know, I'm fascinated by the oddities that pop up at the fringes of the writing and publishing worlds. This qualifies as one of the odder things I've come across lately: T-Post

The brainchild of a group of friends in Sweden, T-Post describes itself as "the world’s first wearable magazine." The concept: A news story. A graphic interpretation of the same. A T-shirt. The art is printed on the front, and the story is printed on the inside (yes, really, on the inside, where no one can see it)--and voila! News you can carry with you, if not very obviously.

Subscribers to T-Post get one T-shirt every five weeks, with a story chosen by T-Post's editors from news pieces submitted by participating writers. It costs 20 euros (per T-shirt or "issue") to subscribe, with a further 7 euros due for shipping and handling. Unlike book of the month clubs, you can't choose not to receive a T-shirt.

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Tags: Writer Beware
Posted in SFWA Blog, Writer Beware | Comments Off

Nebula Awards 2010 Interview: Nnedi Okorafor

Tuesday, May 10th, 2011

by Samuel Montgomery-Blinn

Nnedi Okorafor is the award-winning author of the young adult novels Zahrah the Windseeker, The Shadow Speaker, and the just-released Akata Witch, and her short fiction has appeared in Strange Horizons, Writers of the Future, Lightspeed, Clarkesworld, and the anthologies So Long Been Dreaming, Seeds of Change, Eclipse Three, Way of the Wizard, and Life on Mars, but it is her adult debut novel, Who Fears Death, which has garnered her first Nebula Award nomination. As does much of her fiction, Who Fears Death features a strong West African heroine — no strange territory for Okorafor, the Ohio-born daughter of Igbo Nigerian parents. It is her characters’ abilities to face and overcome their fears which empower them to take control of their destinies; it is her own ability to write without fear which brings these characters and their worlds to rich, vibrant life. A professor of creative writing at Chicago State  University, Okorafor will also be the Amazon.com visiting writer at this summer’s Shared Worlds teen writing camp.

 

When you finished Who Fears Death what was your greatest fear about the book?

When I finished Who Fears Death, I knew I had written a hell of a novel and I wanted other people to read it. The “Oh-my-God-what-have-I-done?” feeling came just before publication. My greatest fear was that I was going to really piss off a lot of people. The novel takes on some heavy issues and it’s unapologetic and unflinching. It’s not a novel that tries to be prim and proper. It’s not polite. It doesn’t beat around the bush. And yes, it’s full of anger. My own anger. But there is great love in the novel, too, so I held on to that fact to assuage my fears.

Also, I feared that readers would get so caught up in trying to locate what was familiar or positioning the book in some tradition or slapping it with some label, that other aspects of the book would be ignored. I don’t know what the obsession is with needing to label things but it’s a practice that rarely serves me well.

Onyesonwu faces racism from both sides; she faces sexism from multiple male-dominated fronts; she faces loneliness and love and loss; and she faces her death, its manner but not time known to her for much of the book. Would you want to know the manner of your death ahead of time? How do you think it would change you? How do you see it as having changed Onyesonwu?

I wouldn’t want to know. I believe some things are written. Some. Knowing would only cause me to fixate on the inevitable as opposed to focusing on what it is that I was put here to do. How do I think knowing affected Onyesonwu? In her case, it liberated her to follow her instincts. But that was because she was already in a rather intense situation.
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Tags: interviews, Nnedi Okorafor, Samuel Montgomery-Blinn
Posted in Nebula Awards, SFWA Blog | 2 Comments »

Guest Post: Writing Advice

Sunday, May 8th, 2011

by Helena Bell.

Dear Potential Writer,

My [neighbor, parent, co-worker, grocery store check-out person] told me that you are working on a novel and could use some advice. Because I am a [very famous, little famous, not at all famous, my own mother can’t remember my name] writer, they asked me.

Maybe your novel is finished, and you want someone to read it and tell you whether it’s any good. Maybe you’re almost done, but not sure whether it’s worth the effort. Or maybe you just have an idea and want me to write the novel for you for a ½ share of the profits. Whatever the case, there’s a limit as to what I can do for you. It’s not because I don’t like you, your novel, or your idea. It’s not because I am too busy signing autographs. And it’s not because I am jealous of your talent and want to eliminate my potential competition. It’s because it’s for your own good.

A lot of other writers, better writers than I am, have answered this question before: glibly, honestly, intelligently. They use comparisons to plumbers, lawyers, and other professions for whom you would never think of asking for free advice. I’ve read these responses and passed them on to my writer friends because when we read them we sigh and say, ‘Yes, that is it exactly.’ But that’s not what you want or need to hear right now. You want the sufficient and necessary conditions to publication. You want to make sure you don’t make a fool out of yourself through ignorance of the rules of etiquette. You don’t want to spend ten years doing X, when it turns out you should have been doing Y.
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Tags: Helena Bell, writing advice
Posted in Advice for New Writers, Information Center, SFWA Blog, Tips for Beginners | 3 Comments »

Quick Updates for 2011-05-08

Sunday, May 8th, 2011

• Congratulations to SFWA member @BrandSanderson on his Whitney Award win for "The Way Of Kings." #

Tags: twitter
Posted in Excluded Categories | Comments Off

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