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Clark, Mendelson, and Scott:
New Name for a Fee-Charging Agency
Every time I bemoan Writer Beware’s overpacked file drawers, and wonder whether I should get rid of files for agents and publishers that have gone out of business (or at least consign them to the basement), I’m reminded of why…
Key Conditions for Suspense:
Part 25 – Patterns for Struggle Elements 5 & 6
The stories that use insight and decision are usually those where the main obstacle is the character’s internal problem. For example, in stories where love and friendship is on the line and the obstacle is the main character’s values, it…
In Memoriam: Joel Rosenberg
Joel Rosenberg (b.1954) died on the evening of June 2, a day after suffering a respiratory depression that caused a heart attack, anoxic brain damage and major organ failure. Rosenberg’s first published short story was “Like the Gentle Rains” in…
Contract Red Flag: Net Profit Royalty Clauses
Publishers that pay on net profit often pay higher royalty percentages than average, and if the percentage is large enough–50% or more–it may offset the deductions. But be sure you know exactly what those deductions are.
Guest Post: Proprioception
Being paralyzed led me to becoming a writer. While in that incapacitated state, I began spinning stories in order to go to the places I physically could not. It was no surprise that those stories were science fiction and fantasy,…
Key Conditions for Suspense:
Part 24 – Patterns for Struggle Elements 3 – 5
Just as I need to know my hero’s goal, motives, and plan, I also need to know the same things about my antagonist. In fact, in some stories the antagonist’s plans are what drive the story.
PublishAmerica Will Be Your Literary Agent…For $199
Literary agencies becoming publishers? Screw that trend. PublishAmerica, always a trail blazer, is swinging the other way.
John E. Johnston, III, Awarded SFWA Service Award
John E. Johnston, III, was the recipient of this year’s SFWA Service Award, presented at the Nebula Awards ceremony in Washington, D.C. The SFWA Service Award is given at the discretion of the President and with Board approval to a…
Guest Post: The Watcher and the Weird
The Weird, as opposed to horror or dark fantasy, has a slippery quality of “you know it when you read it,” with an element of terror, perhaps, but more likely unease.
Quick Updates for 2011-05-25
Industry News and Member News for Jakob Drud, Patrick O’Sullivan, Matthew Sanborn Smith, Erin Hoffman, Dave Freer, Jon Armstrong, Brandon Sanderson, Anna D. Allen, David Levine, Allan Cole, Karen Azinger, and Ferrett Steinmetz.
Quick Updates for 2011-05-24
Industry News and Member News for Paul Celmer, Natania Barron, Thomas Mays, Mary G. Thompson, Barb Hendee, Rae Carson, Rachel Graves, Diane Whiteside, Dave Gross, Ferrett Steinmetz, Stina Leicht, Eugie Foster, James Treadwell, and Sunny Moraine.
Nebula Award Winners
And the Nebula goes to…
Key Conditions for Suspense:
Part 23 – Patterns for the Struggle : Element 2
Taking the readers to the point where it seems their worst fears will be realized and then turning it around only makes the victory sweeter. Giving the reader great hope, just before everything falls apart, makes the loss feel so…
Watch the Nebula Awards Ceremony live!
Tune in Saturday evening, May 21, 2010 at 8:15 P.M. EDT for the Nebula award ceremony. For the second year in a row, one of the premier awards in science fiction will be streamed live on the Web. This Saturday,…
Golden Duck Awards 2010
This year’s Golden Duck Awards have been announced. Designed to encourage science fiction literature for children, The Golden Duck Awards are presented every year at Worldcon.
Tidbits
How threatened do publishers feel by agencies’ aggressive moves into publishing? Well, according to a report today in The Bookseller, Random House UK has done an end run around prestigious literary agency Sheil Land, directly approaching author Tom Sharpe to…
Literary Agencies as Publishers: An Accelerating Trend
Last week, prestigious UK agency Ed Victor Ltd. announced that it was going into publishing, with an ebook/print-on-demand division called Bedford Square Books.
Hunting Down the Value of Social Media
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.
Key Conditions for Suspense:
Part 22 – Patterns for the Struggle: Element 1
What you need to do is keep throwing troubles, conflicts, surprises, and obstacles at the reader. You also need to let the hero have some successes. This allows the reader to have cause to fear AND hope,…
Nebula Awards Weekend: Mass Book Signing
Forty authors will sign their books at the Nebula Awards Weekend, Friday, May 20, 2011 from 5:30 p.m. until 7:00 p.m. at the Washington Hilton at 1919 Connecticut Avenue, NW, Washington, D.C.–located four blocks from the Dupont Circle Metro Station…
I Broke a News Story, and All I Got Was This Freaking T-Shirt
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.
Nebula Awards 2010 Interview: Nnedi Okorafor
My characters always come first. You can’t have a plot if you don’t know who is going to move through it. Onyesonwu came to me way before her story did. The first scene I wrote was the…
Guest Post: Writing Advice
You become a writer by writing. You learn by damaging your ego, and giving more of yourself than you take. By a thousand revelations, by millions of words you improve.
Key Conditions for Suspense:
Part 21 – Patterns for Presenting the Problem: Elements 4-5
If the main character is sympathetic and interesting, the reader will root for her and want to see what happens. If some of the particularities of the character and problem are surprising to the readers, it will generate more interest…