New iHero story from yours truly! The first in at least ten years!

If you missed any of the earlier notices, iHero Entertainment has found new life at www.superherofiction.com. That's where new stories in the fan-favorite and award-winning fiction zine (both e-zine and magazine) will be debuting for the foreseeable future. It already features tales by iHero creator Frank Fradella and staff writer Matt Hiebert, and now I've published my first new iHero story to the site -- "Glissando." 

It's right here: http://www.superherofiction.com/superhero-fiction/glissando-by-sean-taylor-an-ihero-entertainment-tale/

Here's a taste. 

(Language warning for those who care about such things.)

What a fucking job. Pushing a fucking plastic cart around and picking up dog shit and trash for eight hours a day when he should be headlining at least the lower rent bars in the downtown piss holes of the big cities down here in the Southeast. Latex gloves and dog shit. What a fucking job.

He was a fucking rock and roll guitarist. Born and bred. And gifted beyond the ken of mortal men and all that shit.

No. Seriously. Gifted. Gif-fucking-ted. Like a superhero for the rock and roll set. As stupid as it sounds.

“Not all people who are born with super-normal powers can fly or pick up tanks, son,” his dad, a two-bit prick he had called Thomas and never Dad had told him enough times to make it into a mantra. “Some of us have to find more subtle uses for our abilities.”

“Yes, Thomas,” he had said at the time, not really caring. He had been too busy dreaming of costumes and colors.

Thomas Hadensmith was dead now, of course, died a few weeks after he ran off on Tommy and his mom with a little redheaded saxophone player from Memphis. The old man had called her Belle, for Memphis Belle, and he laughed like it was the funniest fucking joke in the world every time he told it. Even when he told it on the day he left.

Read the full story: http://www.superherofiction.com/superhero-fiction/glissando-by-sean-taylor-an-ihero-entertainment-tale/

iHero is back as SuperHeroFiction.com!

That's right. The award-winning superhero fiction of iHero Entertainment is back with the same cast of writers you know and love from the original run -- Frank Fradella, Matt Hiebert, and Sean Taylor

Featuring all new stories of characters both old and new. 

Check it out at www.superherofiction.com.

Oh, Oh, Oh, It's Magic! Building Magic Systems in Fiction.

It's a staple in the worlds of fantasy fiction. Not just that, but you also encounter it in some sci-fi tales and quite a few of the various "-punks" that scatter the literary landscape. But outside of just copying the classics, how do writers actually put together a system of magic that makes sense in their settings?

How much thought do you put into your magic systems in fantasy (or even sci-fi in some situations)? Is it similar to the world building or even like another character or setting in its own right?

HC Playa: How deeply I delve into the system rather depends on the story. Generally there are some things that I have to consider:

1. Does everyone use magic?
2. Is it attached to divinity/religion?
3. Is it innate or conferred through special objects or rituals?
4. Do all beings in the world use or view the magic similarly?

Ernest Russell: Great Topic! I have found codifying the basics is important. I liken it to Asimov's laws of robotics.. here are the guidelines now, normally more than three, then ask can this work according to these guides in attempt not to break the system. Of course, someone often ends up breaking or trying to break the system. Intentional- they're usually a villain. Unintentional - often the McGuffin for the story.

Marian Allen: In my fantasy trilogy, Sage, the "magic" and "religion" are pretty much the same thing. I did quite a bit of research and thinking and note-taking to separate this into two different attitudes/approaches, one of harmony and one of domination. I wouldn't say the two are characters, but they certainly reflect and define the "good guys" and the "bad guys."

Frank Fradella: When I write in a magical setting, it's important for me that magic is vital to the story. If I can take magic out of the story and still tell the story, then I'm doing it wrong. For me, it can't be something you tack on for flavor. Magic IS the setting.

Tamara Lowery: My magic system is pretty soft, and I tend to make things up as I go. I have been pleasantly surprised when my subconscious applied known science on some aspects. For instance, I have gold coated vines which are carnivorous. Most real carnivorous plants develop in environments which don't afford much sunlight for photosynthesis. I didn't do that on purpose, but it works.

Sean Taylor: For me, magic is not a typical part of my fiction, but in the case when it is important, I like to take the time to figure out why and how it works. I like to get beyond the sort of "djinn" approach, where anything goes. I like the idea of tying magic to things like the five senses, the four humors, or the base elements, that sort of thing. 

What are your rules/guidelines for designing a magic system in your novels and stories?

Marian Allen: The rules/guidelines are the same as anything else: a magic/religious system has to have its own internal logic and has to have a solid reason for being part of the story or novel, not just be window dressing.

Frank Fradella: I try to think of magic as "science we don't yet understand." I don't bend science to fit my stories, and I give magic the same respect. I have clearly defined rules for how magic works, what it can do, and what it can't do. I work within the broad limits of those rules.

Mari Hersh-Tudor: I have two magic systems in my fantasy world: one for humans and one for nonhumans. Humans require study and spells and accoutrements. Nonhumans have an innate ability and require only discipline and willpower.

Kaleb Kramer: I tend to do a lot of thought, and no real rules, because it is very different for each project, and so much of the thematic and symbolic elements are tied into magic, that addressing magic is, for me, fundamentally addressing the theme, tone, and feel of the entire project

Sean Taylor: The best idea for magic I ever heard, and the one rule I've stuck to throughout my career came from you, Frank. It's this: If magic is energy, then it must follow the laws of energy. If something happens, an equal and opposite happens elsewhere. Nothing new can be created without pulling from something else. The law of energy conservation must be maintains. We even wrote a pair of stories that did this for a holiday themed posting on iHero. So much fun. And such a good rule for energy-based magic. 

Ef Deal: I put a lot of thought into it. Recently I researched both zombies and vampires before literature or film defined them. Once I realized the variety of types in myth and legend, I had to establish my own world’s version of these, and my workshop members who were not genre readers insisted it was a huge mess of disinformation. EVERYONE knows vampires sparkle and burst into flames in sunlight. EVERYONE knows zombies are the result of science gone awry—radiation or patient zero. But I spent hours and hours of research that didn’t involve watching movies. I had to take info time refuting the misapprehensions. In the end, I had my MC mock the sources of those tropes.

Ernest Russell: Another aspect to figure out what type of magic and is there more than one type? Will it be physical magic? Energy based? Spirit based? Is the mana high, low, none.

I have a series of short stories all set in a low mana version of our world. The magic is based on will and is channeled through the pineal gland. A few people can use a focus to do magic. Others have to make intense preparation, have large number of people, ritual and so to create magic. And the vast majority don't have a clue. The currently published is in All That Weird Jazz. Another, following different character will arrive in a Gothic horror anthology.

HC Playa: Much like with my plots, in my early writing magic tended to be as I go, making up the rules as I went. The more I have written, especially after taking a world building workshop, I tend to treat it as part of the world building and decide the things listed above before diving into the story. One of my most common choices is to apply different "rules" OR different views of it to different groups, which automatically builds conflict into the system and plot.

Copycat, Copycat: Writers on Copying Our Inspirations

It's a common story. Writers get into writing because they're inspired by certain authors who have influenced them. And, almost always, at first they emulate them in at least style, if not substance and theme.

But let's move it from the general to specific and talk about YOU, writer.

Which author or authors were your beginning models to copy when you started? When did that copying start to shift into something that would grow into your own voice and style?

Ef Deal: My earliest influences were Bradbury and the Alfred Hitchcock anthologies. Then Tolkien. The handwavium aspect of Bradbury is the basis of all steampunk, if you think about it, so yes that fantastic element is still in my works. But mostly I was influenced by my studies in French literature, where words were chosen for their greatest effect. Poe said all elements of a story should work together to create a unified effect, and that has been my guiding mantra.

Rob Cerio: Douglas Adams, Issac Azimov, and Clive Cussler. I think my style grew into its own after I stopped worrying about making jokes that sounded like "Bad Douglas Adams" Jokes, and just let them be funny on their own.

John L. Taylor: At the beginning, I was an imitator of Ray Bradbury and John Updike to a vast extent. All my work from that period was soundly rejected as it was a pale imitation of a superior author. I had tried to write a novel manuscript, but the early draft was a meandering pile of exposition. Note I hadn't tried writing horror or New Pulp yet despite being a major fan of the genres. I began developing a voice of my own, oddly, while writing erotica under a pen name for a now defunct website (Ironically, those unpaid stories are still my most widely read at 6k or more reads). I somehow connected with an audience by writing the type of story I wanted to read. My voice in writing finally emerged while writing The Rocket Molly Syndicate for the Dieselpunk E-Pulp Showcase Vol.2 in 2013-14. My Mom was fighting ovarian cancer as I was working on it, half was written in hospital waiting rooms. I needed a release and wrote pure escapist fiction. It connected, and the anthology it appeared in moved about 775 copies across all platforms and was adapted as an audio drama for the Coffee Contrails Podcast, adding another 200 or so downloads. It is still my most successful work to date. I dug further into New Pulp, but with a strong influence from Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard. My next works were The Legend of the Wild Man, a 100 line narrative poem that ran in the Mythic Circle, and The Thing in the Wexler House, an audio narration that Otis Jiry performed for me on his YouTube channel. Both got solid receptions. As I branched into poetry, more growth happened, and My current style was cemented. Eerie, dreamlike narratives with a pulp twist. Also, writing online narrations helped a lot, as I was introduced to horror voices different from what I'd read before. Variety helps a lot.

Anna Grace Carpenter: The first I remember trying to imitate was Cordwainer Smith. He had a flair for not letting story get in the way of the occasional stylistic flourish and I loved it. Later Tad Williams and Raymond E. Feist made an impact on how I used characters to best tell the "exciting" parts in ways that actually had an emotional impact, plus a particular style of world-building that has stuck with me. (I would be hard-pressed to explain this, but I know that it's there because of reading their work.)

Things started to be less copycat once I really started writing a lot. The more I was using words in storytelling regularly, the more my own style began to emerge from the way I pictured certain scenes and the dialog I heard from my characters. At which point those authors moved from a category of imitation to one of influence.

HC Playa: So there are 4 authors that spurred me into writing: Sherrilyn McQueen, J.R. Ward, Karen Marie Moning, and Patricia Potter.

All four build intricate worlds, whether it's dropping you into the romantic lives of people in 1100 AD Scotland, a hidden Vampire society, a murder investigation turned apocalyptic collision of Fae realms and human, or weaving mythology into romance and adventure.

I didn't copy any of them directly, but they all made characters breathe on the page. They weren't afraid to weave love into blood and gore and battles. One of my favorite things that I did copy was the reoccurring cast that doesn't necessarily feature the same POV from book to book.

Ernest Russell: My earliest influences were Poe, Verne, Wells, and an anthology called Tales of Time and Space. Later Lovecraft and the circle of writers from Weird Tales.

Of these early influences, there is one that influences every story. That is Jules Verne. One of the things I LOVE about Verne's stories is he did research and did his best to not only incorporate the science and technology of the story's time period but to project it forward into what might become. As such I try, even in my fantasy writing to research what I am writing and make it plausible within both the world rules for the story and what I find historically or current science and technology and translate it into the story.

Frank Fradella: F. Scott Fitzgerald, Robert B. Parker, and Chris Claremont. Remove any one of them and I'm not sure I'd be a writer at all. My college professor in English told me to look at Parker for dialogue, and he was right. Fitzgerald showed me how to make prose feel like poetry, but it was Claremont who taught me how to tell a story. I had been reading comics books off the spinner rack for years, but the first comic book I *remember* is Uncanny X-Men #131.

Tom Powers: A weird mix of Walter Gibson, Paul Ernst, and H.P. Lovecraft. Still echoes of them all, plus a bit of Norvell Page. Much of what I write is in the traditions of those writers' genres.

Pj Lozito: I wanted to write like Lester Dent, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Raymond Chandler and Sax Rohmer.

Teel James Glenn: Robert E Howard, Lester Dent, Peter O'Donnell, Dash Hammett.

Krystal Rollins: My inspiration: Mary Higgins Clark from my past, and my present is you,, Sean. Her work continues to inspire me in how I create my characters. Her words are printed in black ink and white paper but in my mind, it's blooming with color. I keep writing Sean because of you. (Editor's Note: Awww... Shucks. Thanks, Krystal.)

Charles Gramlich: Ray Bradbury for one

Murky Master: So Dragonlance and the anime Escaflowne, above all else, got me into writing seriously when I was about 13 years old. It took another ten years before I returned to that old dream, but I wrote part of a fantasy novel in those days that I am still surprised at its quality compared to what I wrote today.

John Morgan Neal: Stan Lee, John Broome, Gardner Fox, Bill Finger, Bob Haney, Denny O'Neil, Archie Goodwin, Len Wein, Steve Englehart, Jim Starlin, Roy Thomas, Doug Moench, Michael Michael A. Baron, John Ostrander, Mike Barr, William Messner-Loebs, Bill Mantlo, Marv Wolfman, and last but opposite of least, Chuck Dixon.

Michael Dean Jackson: When I started writing (as Jack Mackenzie) I was inspired by a lot of military science fiction; Heinlein, Jack Campbell, David Weber, Lois McMaster Bujold, etc. It was with those inspirations that I wrote THE PARADIGM TRAP and THE MASK OF ETERNITY.

Do those elements of your inspirations still show up in your current work? Howso? Are they things you do consciously or have they just been internalized by the years of doing them?

Frank Fradella: Completely internalized. I took Parker's style for a spin on its own, and it felt like wearing one of those 1970 Halloween costumes that comes with the hard plastic Batman mask attached by a string. It was a conscious choice to find me in that amalgam, and that's the writer I became.

Anna Grace Carpenter: I do still love a stylish bit of storytelling. Voice, unexpected use of language and grammar (or lack thereof) to catch the reader's attention at a critical moment are some of my favorite things. And that all grew from early attempts to mimic Cordwainer Smith. And the storytelling inspiration I got from Feist and Williams is still there too. Using all the characters to tell the story whether we see their PoV or not. Allowing heroes to not always be heroic and villains to not always be villainous without diving into a grimdark grey. And allowing tragedy to occur, sometimes in very small ways that adds a bittersweetness to big triumphs.

I don't think it's deliberate, it's just how those inspirations encouraged my own voice and writing the kind of stories I like to read. Because that was what first made me want to imitate them - they wrote stories I loved. And now I write stories I love so the influence is still there, but organically after years of practicing my own storytelling.

HC Playa: At some point, I found my own writing voice, but for all my novels, these elements remain, including having two central protagonists (usually a male-female romantic pairing, but like JR Ward, I branched out the more I wrote).

Depending on the story it can almost seem like a hero and side-kick type of casting, especially as I pit them against larger-than-life dangers. (As I type this I suddenly see why my publisher says my writing is pulp 😂.) I don't lean into the romance aspect as much as those authors tended to. More like Moning's Fae Fever series, the romantic aspects take a back seat to the apocalyptic events and characters dealing with their issues.

I have read plenty of classics of multiple genres, but it would be disingenuous to say I am influenced in style by those stories.

I don't aim to write the next classic that future college students dissect to figure out what I meant when I said the sofa was an ugly flea market reject.

I write to entertain. I use elements from the stories I love reading. I love weaving in magic and the amazing, because life always needs magic.

John Morgan Neal: Yes. I'm a big ol' ape in more ways than one. But never outright. The stuff I love is in my DNA. So it has to shine through.

John L. Taylor: Many facets of my inspirations are like a reflex now. A subconscious thread. I still lean on Lovecraftian themes and first-person narrations in horror but avoid the adjective salad pulp writers often used when stories paid by the word (Lovecraft was great at taking a whole paragraph of them to say "it was an amalgam of parts that defied description, an offense to biology itself.") I guess that's the real difference between me and my inspirations: I prize concise writing. I suppose that's the last vestige of Updike left in me. But it's a great influence to retain/

Rob Cerio: I still feel like I use Cussler's "opening Gambit" formula and basic formatting of action scenes. Azimov's use of "working-class schlubs" is something that still crops up all the time in my work.

TammyJo Eckhart: I can't answer question one so question two also doesn't apply. While there are authors that I loved and still love, the idea of copying them in any way never entered my mind. I was writing stories from kindergarten onward.

Murky Master: Things I took from Dragonlance were:

• mixing cultures is both hugely interesting and creates lots of conflict, from Tanis Halfelven's internal identity drama. I'm biracial myself so it was interesting seeing someone "like me"
• Bad guys are F-ing Awesome. Raistlin made a permanent mark on my picture of wizards and magic and the lure of power magic brings. You need no further proof than to behold my profile pic, after all. Nothing makes me hahaha quite as much as my hourglass-eyed boi. Lord Soth was pure mother finding METAL as well and remains my fave Ravenloft Darklord.
• Escaflowne was a romance and an epic fantasy all at once. Later on, I would actually sit down and read a romance novel and find it totally awesome, and I like to have strong, real relationships in my books because of that anime.
• also, the anime was grand in scope, full of pathos and beautiful at times, unspeakably cruel at others (looking at you Dilandau). It helped me understand PTSD and the weight of honor as well as the power of dreams to destroy and create. Dilandau also made me like insane villains.
• the Adventures of Batman and Robin cartoon with Bruce Tim as the art director also made me love art deco and Pulp sentiments. The episode featuring "The Grey Ghost" and Brendan Frasers The Mummy sealed my fate. Now I can't help but have all cap titled like DESTROYERS FROM WALMARTS BEYOND and COURT OF THE GLISTENING LUNCH LADIES and such.

Chuck Dixon: I read so much before I started writing for a living that I have no idea who's work I've intuited over the years.

Michael Dean Jackson: However, around the time I was writing my books I discovered the television series SHARPE on the History Channel. I loved every episode and I loved Sean Bean as Richard Sharpe. So I figured I would try the novels by Bernard Cornwell and I loved them even more. The books were, I found, immensely better than the show.

And it was those novels and the character of Sharpe who fired up my imagination and helped me come up with my own, military SF version, a character called Jefferson Odett.

I have only written two Jefferson Odett books, DEBT'S PLEDGE and DEBT'S STAND, but I do have a third one that I may eventually get to. Nevertheless, Jefferson Odett is more than a little inspired by Richard Sharpe, in the same way that Horatio Hornblower, C.S. Forrester's seafaring adventure hero, inspired Bernard Cornwell's character.

I am under no illusion that my novels have anywhere near the quality of Cornwell's or Forrester's, but the inspiration is there.

Geek's Guide announces Unlocking Your Super Powers by Frank Fradella!

 

 The Geek's Guide Program — Unlocking Your Super Powers — is available to you as three different paths: a manual and workbook, a self-directed video course, or 6-week live coaching program. Each one has its own benefits, but the 9 life-altering tools are included in each one!

"What can this do for me?"

No matter where you are in your particular journey, the Geek's Guide can help you level up. If you're feeling stuck, or limited in your possibilities; if you're suffering from depression or anxiety, or even if you're already on the road to better things, the program is designed to help you shift your point of view and give you 9 tools that enable you to make rapid, radical change.

The Geek's Guide Program delivers the same concepts used by everyone from Tony Robbins to Plato, but focuses them through the lens of science fiction, fantasy, comics, and gaming so you get the tools while celebrating these things we love. It's an amazing time to be a geek!

https://geeksguideprogram.com/

Forget the Scissors, I Need a Machete!

Will these do?

For this week's writer roundtable, we're going to talk about cutting words -- and not just a word here and there but a significant amount of them. 

Here's the scenario... You finish your latest novel or novella, but you're WAY over the word count. 

WAY, WAY OVER. 

How do you get it back to the side your editor wants? 

What are your techniques for serious trimming on your work?

Lee Houston Jr.: Actually, there have been a lot of times where my writing buddy and friendly neighborhood beta-proofreader Nancy Hansen says I write too tersely and always fall short of the minimum word count, so I go back and keep re-reading and adding more until I've reached the goal.

In the end, if I'm over, I just reverse the process. I keep rereading and subtracting. Making choices in that category is tougher because you cannot be so in love with your own prose that you are unwilling to cut anything, even if in hindsight the passage in question actually doesn't add anything to the overall story.

But whichever way you're headed, you have to be careful not to subtract too much or your story might not make sense and adding too much could have your readers think you "pad" your stories.

It's a tricky tightrope to traverse, but every writer finds themselves walking it at one point or another during any project. The real trick is to get to the other side successfully.

PJ Lozito: I am a big believer in cutting out (but save it to a file!). That's one reason I don't think giving a daily word count means much. As for getting up to size, I have notes I can and do use. Nothing makes me prouder than finally being able to use some interesting tidbit I was saving.

I heard you were looking for a word-cutter.

Nancy Hansen: Anybody who's had to edit or publish me knows, I write too big at times. I have to cut all the time, and it's hardest with your own work. I can show you where to cut, but I can't seem to see it in my own stuff—at least not initially. So first off, if I have time, I set the piece aside and go on to something else. It's kind of like cleansing your palate with something in between courses. When I go back, I have fresh eyes. If that doesn't work, I'll hand it over to someone else, a trusted beta reader or even the editor who is waiting for it, and explain that I've tried to cut back but I am too close to the material to see where, and could you please take a look. Nine times out of ten with a short piece people are happy to help, and they give you an idea where and what should go. On longer pieces like novels, the usual advice is to look for a spot where something momentous is about to occur and taper it off there. Most times I can figure it out myself, but now and then you need a different pair of eyes.

Frank Fradella: Step One: Check your ego.

Step Two: Ask yourself if you have started this story as late as possible. Do I need this first chapter? The first three? Am I creating too much preamble? Do I REALLY need this characters origin or can it be revealed as necessary through dialogue or flashback later on?

Step Three: Ask yourself what purpose each character serves in the story. Do you have two characters who play the same or similar role? Can you eliminate one of them?

Step Four: Identify the purpose of each and every scene. Chances are you have one or two that you're chalking up to "character development" that can be axed outright.

Step Five: Push back. If every single character or every single scene has an unshakable purpose, present your case to your editor and ask them to suggest edits, and then be prepared to show why those scenes or characters need to be there. But remember Step One. Very often, they're right and you can make the cut. So cut.

Robert Krog: I start by searching for and deleting adverbs, interjections, needless intensifiers, words like just, so, and well. That always reduces the word count by a bit. Then, I go through and find wordy phrases that can be supplanted by fewer or even one word. Why be lazy and write "very happy" when "elated" means the same thing and so much more? When this too has failed to reduce the word count into the acceptable range, I begin looking for passages that don't advance the plot or build character. This is the painful part because I thought they all advanced the plot and added to characters when I was writing. I have, occasionally reduced the role of or even cut extraneous characters from stories. This usually does the trick. If the protagonist is still able to do all that needed doing without the sidekick, and the sidekick didn't add much or anything meaningful to the story, then out the sidekick goes. This greatly reduces the verbiage. Sometimes, I have already written lean enough that such cannot be done, in which case I've had to ask the editor for leniency on the word count. This has been known to work, but not often. Sometimes the editor will shoot back with suggested cuts, and I will have to admit that the editor is correct. Another trick is, of course, to look for inadvertent info dumps and eliminate them. Working the required information into the story in a show rather than tell format is usually less wordy, and the reader didn't buy a work of fiction expecting textbook style writing, anyway. Information dumps often insult the intelligence of the reader. Respecting the reader's ability to pick up what is needed from context is a good policy and should be used whenever possible.

The Internet called and said you wanted an editor.

Ellie Raine: Usually, I first look at each chapter and determine if I can afford to cut those out, or cut them in half. Sometimes, the hardest things to catch are the not-so-integral scenes before and after the good, important, meaty bits that actually matter, and firing those. It's usually mundane things like the character asking the desk clerk to check in, when that can be wrapped up in a paragraph to get to the scene where his hotel suite is broken into. Basically, I just look at what I think should be the focus of the audience's attention and cut the fat out.

Bobby Nash: The first things I look for are any side trips or character moments that, while can be great, don't necessarily advance the plot. After that, it's looking for extraneous words, adverbs, and tags that can be cut.

Lance Stahlberg: I am literally going thru that scenario now. Was also thinking it was blog worthy of listing off what I did. (Posted here: http://lrstahlberg.blogspot.com/2017/06/tips-to-reduce-word-count_23.html)

Matt Hiebert: The words "Kill Your Darlings" always haunt me. But I don't kill them. I cut and paste them into another document. Although I never go back and read them, I know they're there and not gone. Not dead.

When the Sh*t Hits the Fan: Ramping Up Toward the Conclusion

We've thrown soft lobs for the past few weeks for the roundtables, so it's high time we get back into some practical, useful advice for writers from our shared experience.

Obviously, there will be some difference between writers, and between writing styles (pantsers vs. plotters, etc.), but the end result is the same -- there comes a time in your story when it's time to shift into the higher gears and work some emotion and action and intensity toward your conclusion.

When you're either writing as a pantser or plotting as a plotter, how do you know when that moment has come, when it's time to ramp up the story and begin that third act in earnest?

Jim D. Gillentine: I'm a pantster. So I guess I'll start. I try to do a slow build up from about the middle of the story. I make it more and more intense by each chapter. My editor told me I achieved this with my latest book, Crossroads, the sequel to The Beast Within. As each chapter played out, she told me she was getting more and more drawn into the story. Feeling anger at what was happening to my two main characters that had been captured by the big bads in my little tale. Until, BOOM! They fought back to regain their freedom. She said it was a perfect build up of tension that reached a point where as reader she cheered when the shit started to go down.

I.A. Watson: That point comes when all the pieces are on the board and now its time to crash them all together. It's very rare that there's a "new element" in the third act. It all has to have been Chekhov Gunned by them. When all the dominoes are finally in a row -- push!

Frank Fradella: I think almost strictly in terms of character, tension and event. Your main character should have a desire, a motivation. They want something. That's obvious, right? Your story arises when someone or something has a conflicting motivation, preventing your character from getting what they want. If you look at the second character exactly the same way you would your main character — that is to say, not a prop who exists solely to provide an obstacle to your hero, but the hero of their own story — then you drive them forward toward their goal with the same zeal you do your protagonist. There's your tension. There's your conflict. Introduce events to bring them together, drive them apart, up the stakes, but the driving force should always be the conflict between these two uncompromising drives.

My favorite example from comics is Magneto and Professor Xavier. Magneto is a compelling character in his own right. He's not a cardboard stand-up waiting for some random X-man to knock him down. He's a purpose-driven protagonist in his own story, dedicated to the preservation of his people by any means necessary. Then some bald idiot in a wheelchair wants to get everyone in a group hug and sing kumbaya. Jerk.

Selah Janel: I fall in between the two categories -- I have very specific moments I want to hit, but I also leave a lot of room for characters to develop and guide the plot, as well. For me, that moment where things really turn a corner and bear down is always a pretty natural escalation. I usually know that's the moment I'm building toward, and make it a point to guide the plot and energy to it. Now, I may go back after the first draft and hone things to make it more of a specific build, but I usually have at least one moment that things are being guided to.

Ric Martens: For me its kind of an organic thing... when the story is at a point it can't handle the pressure.. then I know its time to ramp up the end.

Corrina Lawson: I usually know that moment when I start and write to it. If I don't or have an inexact idea, I write down several, discard what I've done or seen done before and instead pick the more original idea.

Walter Bosley: It's time to ramp up and begin the third act when I've finished the second act. I don't mean to be flippant, but even though I know what my ending will be, I pretty much go with the intuition and appropriate degree of faith in format and structure as to when I've reached the end of the second act. For me, in my stuff, it's clear when I've reached that point and then I simply ramp it up because I'm "officially" in the third act.

Stephanie Osborn: Well, to be honest, since I don't write sequentially anyhow, it's not unusual for the climax to be one of, if not THE, first thing I write. Usually what winds up happening for me is that I have all the major plot points written, and then it becomes a matter of connecting the dots. Rarely I will realize that the climax is going to be so intense that I will put off writing it until the end -- usually the VERY end.

Bill Craig: My stuff is all very character driven and as the tension begins to built toward the home stretch things start to happen and the clock starts to tick for them and they find things moving fast around them and their reactions ramp it up even more.

It is all about the character's reactions. Sometimes they know it is SHTF time before I do. How they react and talk pushes the action forward.

What, if anything, changes about the way you either write (technique) or approach writing (such as workspace, music, etc.) when you ramp up the intensity?

Stephanie Osborn: I will procrastinate for a few days. This is actually necessary, as I am gathering up the energy to write the thing. (I find that it takes a LOT of energy to create a story. My writing mentor, Travis Taylor, likens it to running a mental marathon. When I finally finish a manuscript, I plan to take a few days off to recover, just like you would an athletic competition.)

Then I get everything organized that I might need while I am writing: full water bottle, tissues, good snacks, the phone, whatever. And I position them in easy reach. Depending on my mood and the scene, and how available it is, I may turn on some soft instrumental music to help me "flow."

Then I will read over the material leading up to, and do any editing I feel is needed, whether copy edits, or reworking parts of the material.

This allows me to simply continue writing at the end of the lead-in material. I will then usually write straight through until it's done, however long it takes, because if I stop I may lose the momentum.

Once it's done, I save it down, shut down the computer, and do something completely different to relax and unwind.

I.A. Watson: I try to write the first draft finale in one go, however long it takes. That way I can use the urgency in my imagination on the page too. Also there is caffeine.

Bill Craig: Sometimes I have to step back and take a breath because I am every bit as involved as they are, but I still can't shake the tension.

Walter Bosley: More coffee. And a desire to see the work finished. But the way I work does not change otherwise.

Selah Janel: Technique wise, once the intensity is ramped up, I know I'm going to be hunkered down devoting whatever time is necessary until that bit is finished. For me it's the equivalent of a roller coaster - the worst thing is to have to stop midway through, so I usually ignore everything else until those moments are written and tend to be totally oblivious to everything else. I also either get insanely critical of myself trying to get certain bits right or I'm so deep in the moment that I can let all that go until that section is written - it's usually one extreme or the other.

Frank Fradella: I don't generally outline when I'm writing novels, but I do know the major beats of my story, and I know what the "final battle" between these two forces is; where it happens, why, and how. Nearly all of the pages prior to this are me driving to this destination. That may sound single-minded, and it is. Other authors have their subplots and B-stories and pages of exposition about the shrubbery or curtains. I'm just not that guy. I tend to strip away anything that isn't my reason for telling the story in the first place.

Ric Martens: I tend to get uber focused at this point, not sure I change anything, more just get lost in the world.

Corrina Lawson: I have the opposite problem -- I have to work more on quiet scenes.

What is the difference between ramping up the action, ramping up the emotion, and ramping up the intensity of the story? Or is there no difference?

Selah Janel: I think both an increase of action and increase of emotional tension contribute to the intensity and forward-momentum of the story. You have to raise the stakes, and that will make the characters react in equally amped up ways (hopefully). I love playing with emotional intensity with my characters, probably more than writing action, but a lot of times (especially in genre fiction), that visual element is so important. Still, for me personally, how characters react and how those experiences either build or break them is always the most fascinating and visceral part. I know if I'm on target or not as soon as I write their reactions, and that can either really propel a sequence along or derail me into reworking other parts of the build up. The action may propel the visual and "plot" elements, but the emotion is going to help a reader connect with a character and ramp up the visceral connections. Plus, it all has to be its own complete journey. As a reader, I want a book to feel like listening to a complete song, or going on a theme park ride - you want that full experience, and you want it to feel like a constant build of energy -- a crescendo and decrescendo of sorts. Whether that's action or emotion based really depends on the type of story, but you need that momentum and resolution for the story to feel like a complete unit.

Bill Craig: The ramping up comes on all levels, but it comes in different ways, but it all comes from the characters. for example in this excerpt from my forthcoming Caribe spy novel this new character is introduced but the tension builds quickly as he knows something is about to happen but he doesn't know what.

Erin Banacek looked up when he heard the sound of helicopters. The Ares Oil man frowned. While they had excavated a lot of jungle on the site, he had gotten no word of equipment arriving. From the sound of the rotor blades, these were the heavier Sikorsky choppers that carried heavy machinery and equipment. “Bloody Hell!” he snarled as he stood and headed outside into the compound. “Davies, what the hell is going on?”

“No clue Sir. Who are these guys?”

“I wish I knew.”

“Get security armed and ready. I don’t like the smell of this.”

“Right Boss!”

Banacek headed back into his tent. He wanted his gun handy when he met the choppers. He grabbed his satellite phone too. He wondered if he should call Ms. Connelly about this, then decided that could wait. If this was something she had put in motion, it wouldn’t due to question it. Better to wait and see what was going down and then complain about it later. He put the sat phone in one of the cargo pockets of his pants as he buckled on the pistol belt that held his Colt Government Model 1911-A1 and six spare magazines. He pulled up the flap and drew the pistol, racking back the slide to chamber a round. He stuck it back in the holster and stepped outside, leaving the flap unsecured.

The scene is set and you get an immediate sense of tension and danger.

Walter Bosley: I'd have to analyze that a bit more. I guess I simply have more 'action' and am less verbose in description. My protagonists get less patient with BS, my victims get more desperate, and the villains do more nasty things, I suppose.

I.A. Watson: Ramping up the action often requires heightened stakes, greater urgency, and sometimes a big set-piece event (or countdown to one). That calls for very clear descriptive storytelling, cause and effect stuff. Often it needs short, sharp sentences. For effect.

Ramping up emotion requires revelation, reaction, and usually at least one powerful point of view. Letting the characters loose to say their pieces involves as much plotting and set-up as a big action finale, but the techniques differ. Longer, more elaborate sentences offering insight to inner thoughts and feelings allow for a better reader journey through the characters' torments.

Ramping up intensity is all about how desperate the reader needs to be to turn the page. Either action or emotion can achieve that, as can horror or mystery or wonder or other visceral devices. The key to intensity is pace, and gradually magnifying it. That may mean the pace quickens, as in action scenes, or that each story beat hits harder and heavier, punch after punch. And often, when the spring is wound so tight that its about to snap, there's a roller-roaster release that pays off after.

Ric Martens: There is no difference for me.

Corrina Lawson: They're all entwined. If no emotions are invested, why would we care about a fight? However, I usually try to make the climax big, bigger than any previous action. All at stake, larger action-lime the end of Winter Soldier when everything is in play.

Stephanie Osborn: There are differences, but they are subtle. Usually ramping up action ramps up the other two to some degree. Ramping up emotion tends to ramp up story intensity. Given I write science fiction mysteries for the most part, often the emotion has already ramped up, and the action taken for the climax is like a dam breaking -- it releases the emotion and things run rampant. (At least if I've done it right.)

Do you find that your involvement with the story grows more tense or more relaxed when you're in that "home stretch" of the tale? Why?

Ric Martens: I get way more tense and focused.. I think because I know I am nearing the end and its kind of intense and scary all at once.

Corrina Lawson: More intense. Because if it doesn't work, the whole story falls apart. Plus, I like writing endings whereas middles aren't so fun.

Stephanie Osborn: More tense, much more tense. Because I'm feeling what my protagonists are feeling, and I always have to be a few steps ahead, if not already at the resolution, even if my protag is Sherlock Holmes. Which is really hard to do. Takes a lot of effort. And 99% of the time I am completely caught up in the events. If my husband were to walk up to me without warning me of his presence, he'd have to peel me off the ceiling fan blades, because I'm not "here," I'm "there."

Jim D. Gillentine: As a writer, that is my main goal when I write. I want my readers to be feeling the pain and anger my characters are going through, and if I achieve that going by the seat of my pants, then I did my job to entertain you.

Frank Fradella: As far as tension goes? I think that ramps up naturally, if you're dealing with character first. Most people don't jump to a nuclear option right away. They try the easiest path to their goal first, and only escalate their efforts when they find that blocked.

Walter Bosley: I have to keep myself in check that I maintain whatever "quality" I've metered out through the story to that point, rather than rush through it and crank out a weak third act. I suppose then I must relax as I write it regardless how intense the story gets. I don't see my action as the strength in my stuff. My strengths are the attitudes and dialogue and where I'm willing to go with subject matter.

I.A. Watson: It depends on the kind of story. I generally prefer to get my explanations and motivations clear before the climax, so readers know the stakes and understand the issues (with all due respect to Dumbledore's 25-page justifications and footnotes in the infirmary after each time Harry has saved the day). Making sure that every point is clear and that each character gets a pay-off is quite a cerebral task and can be the hardest part of the writing. But then sometimes there's a wonderful sleigh-ride back to base, where all the hard work getting there just makes the last stretch a joy.

Selah Janel: It depends -- I either want to get everything right or I completely surrender to the story. It really depends on what it is and what my state of mind is at the current moment. I usually want to just let it pour out of me, and that's when I feel I'm at my best, when I can just be a conduit for all the action and emotion and let it happen, leaving the polishing and fine details for later. Even if I re-work that section, I usually have some of my best dialogue or emotional moments come from that initial outpouring. There's something to be said for letting yourself get immersed and letting the story work through you. At the end of the day, if you've done your homework and if your characters are well developed enough, the story knows what it's doing. 

Successful Book Marketing

Ready for our first roundtable of 2015? This one is for authors, publishers, and book marketing folks. Okay, let's kick off the new year right, shall we?

What has been your greatest success in book or ebook marketing?

J.H. Glaze: My greatest success in ebook marketing was a promo I did last year that generated 9,800 downloads in 24 hours. It resulted in residual sales of 450 ebooks over the next week. This was done through a promotion combining at least 10 of the eBook promo sites, some paid - some free, Facebook shares, Twitter Re-Tweets, and posting to groups.

My greatest success in Paperback marketing is definitely Horror Cons. Last year in October, I sold more than $1,400 worth of books over a 3 day weekend. The Conventions usually result in extended sales for about 6 weeks afterward. I have developed a specific strategy and technique for selling at cons, so you may not achieve the same results if you rush out and get a table for the first time. People who have had tables next to me will tell you, I’m a selling machine when I’m working the floor.

John Hartness: Marketing is raising general awareness of your brand or a specific product. It isn’t about sales, it’s about eyeballs and stickiness. The more eyeballs you get on your name, the more often, the stickier you become in people’s minds. Coke is a ubiquitous product, so much so that people will sit down in a restaurant and order a “Coke” when all they really mean is “brown carbonated sugary beverage.” Same with Kleenex and Xerox. Those brands have been marketed so well that they have their own definition. Stephen King is a good example of this – for forty years his name has been synonymous with horror fiction, regardless of his forays into other genres and styles.

Marketing is a long-tail process, and very little that you can once today will have a net effect on your overall branding in a positive light. The same cannot be said for negative branding, just look at people who make headlines for being idiots. Marketing is a cumulative process, and building a brand takes years, and lots of effort.

Promotion is a short-term, sales-focused “event.” A great example of this is the yearly “Toyotathon” that we see so many commercials about. They are trying to cram a quarter’s worth of sales into a month, because fourth quarter sucks for car buying. We try to do the same thing when we drop the price of a book to $.99 or free for a couple days. We try to cram a month’s worth of “buys” into a day. By far the most effective promotion I’ve participated in was when my book was selected as the Kindle Daily Deal. I moved several thousand copies in one day at a reduced price, and about a thousand copies over the rest of the week at full price. And I topped Stephen King on the horror bestseller list! Yes, I screen-capped that bad boy!

A marketing and promotion tool that I have found works very well is my email newsletter. A monthly newsletter has seen a 20% increase in subscribers since I re-launched it, which is a long-tail success, and when I have featured backlist titles in the newsletter, I have seen a corresponding increase in sales of that title for the month it is featured. So that’s a short-term promotional benefit.

Iscah: Direct sales events like at conventions, festivals, fairs, etc.

Mat Nastos: My first book, THE CESTUS CONCERN, was by and far my biggest success to date. With it (between sales across all platforms and my free giveaways), I've moved well over 100,000 copies to readers. Within the first 45 days I was already hitting that 1500 copies per month mark and it went up from there. The keys for it taking off were:

• Finding the right genre to target (men's adventure, action & adventure, and cyberpunk to start...but I constantly tweaked things)
• Having a professional cover that put out the message I wanted and worked for the audience I was targeting (this is a problem for a lot of indy and self-pubbed books)
• Making sure my product pages and my sales blurbs were killer. 
• Finally, adjusting your keywords/tags to help target what potential readers are actually searching to buy, and not getting caught up in focusing on what I wanted them to be. Readers and what they perceive your work to be is more important than my own perception when it comes to building an audience. Once you've got that audience in place you can start messing with their perception, but you need to catch them before you do that.

Frank Fradella: If you do a big con well — like, say, Dragon*Con — the ROI on that is fantastic. It not only sells books (which is great), but it introduces some 50,000 to your brand, which makes sales easier later. And by "do well," I don't mean sitting on your ass behind a six-foot table waiting for sales to come to you. I mean hustling. Do panels, network, schedule signings, host events at the show, launch a book, do giveaways, offer con exclusives. It's a higher price point that most online options, but the benefits outlast the con by several orders of magnitude.

Van Allen Plexico: I've been doing 6-7 cons a year for the last 20 years, and for the last ten I've been doing tons of panels and events, including usually 16-18 panels every Dragon*Con. I have worked my socks off promoting those books during those panels and events and have built something of a name brand/recognition that way. But it's still confined within a fairly small customer base; the trick is to break out of that and hit the more mainstream audience that doesn't really do many cons, etc.

Percival Constantine: Making the first book in a series free, even if it's only temporary, and including links in the back of each book for reviews, email sign-ups, and the next book in the series. But the most successful thing has been to have a clean, organized website with a mailing list.

Susan Burdorf: I have a book out in which I have two short stories - the publisher periodically posts the book with deals she promotes and she will often brag about its Amazon ranking to encourage a look see. Many of the authors I know have joined up to put a first book in a series of books into a boxed set and they have had great success with that because once folks read one book they feel the need to collect the rest of the books.

Mandi M. Lynch: Hard to say. But I have had best luck with Clockwork Spells and Magical Bells. I think it was due to the support we got from the editors.

What marketing strategy taught you the most about what not to do and what did you learn?

J.H. Glaze: Paid advertising on blogs did not result in increased sales. No matter how many subscribers a blog has you are going to be seen by a very limited audience. The blogs with wide distribution sell ads through 3rd party vendors, but still, advertising is not a very cost effective way to get book sales in any medium.

Blog reviews get much better results and can often be obtained for the price of a free book, however most bloggers who do reviews have roomfuls of books they have received for reviewing. If somehow they find the time to review you, and especially if you get a good review from them, be sure to package a portion of your soul and mail it to them to show your gratitude.

John Hartness: Buying an expensive booth at huge conventions. I did New York Comicon in 2013, and I did the show fairly cheaply, couch-surfing at a friend’s house and splitting the cost of the booth three ways. Total expenses – around $1000-1,1000 counting meals, airfare, booth rental, cabs, subway fares and booth furnishings. Total revenue - $950. This doesn’t count the cost of the books, which was probably another $500.

Dragon Con – I spent $350 on a piece of a booth with 13 other authors, sold $1,100 or so, and still ended up spending $2,000 on hotel, food, gas, parking (!) and memberships. Books cost me about $700, because I didn’t sell everything I brought.

Long answer made short – I hand-sell books as well as anyone in the business, and if a convention will cost me more than $500 to attend, I know I will not, under any circumstances, turn a profit at that convention. So I do fewer conventions now, and I tend to only do the ones where I can stay at home, or the ones where I get a free table to sell my wares.

Iscah: Head knowledge and plans don't get you very far without action. I had some lovely marketing ideas that might have been very effective if I had done half of them. But on to something I did sort of well, which was offline selling...

To give you a tip for direct sales, "Smile and engage but keep it short". I'm an introvert who prefers to avoid crowds, so I sort have to put on a sales persona to make it through events. I'm not saying you should be fake, but be the friendliest version of yourself you can be. And try not to ramble. Once introverts get going, we like to have in depth conversations, which is great for building friendships, but lousy for crowded events. Let people who want to leave, leave, so there room for someone else to walk up.

Mat Nastos: Biggest lesson is to know what and how to promote to my various channels. To know that promoting a freebie sale to my social channels is not smart. Each channel you've got - web, social networks, email list, etc - has its own requirements and needs in terms of what/how you sell. Not knowing how to make use of those things will cost you sales. It's sort of like people on Twitter who retweet when someone does a #FF with their name...makes no sense -- you're asking people who already follow you to follow you...Same principal with marketing.

I spent the first month or so marketing the wrong message to the wrong channel.

The other thing I learned was the effectiveness of a proper roll out for my promotions. Learning how to do a build up before a promotion and then what to do to maintain traction once a promotion was over. Making sure I didn't shoot my wad by marketing everything all at once. You can waste a lot of time and resources that way, and miss out on sales.

Frank Fradella: Cyber Age Adventures — the online magazine I founded in 1999 that featured literate, thought-provoking prose stories in a shared superhero universe —taught me a lot about what not to do. While we put out an award-winning product, having a name that made no allusions whatsoever to our content was just plain stupid. And creating a product so groundbreaking that nobody even thought to look for it was the kiss of death. Even now, if you check Google for the number of people looking for "superhero magazines," you'll find that number dwarfed by the number of searches for "superhero novels." Which is why I now own the url superheronovel.com. Live and learn.

Van Allen Plexico: With LUCIAN, I made certain the ads referenced the similarities of Lucian to Loki from Thor/Avengers. I wrote the book in 2002-03 but am glad to take advantage of the fact that they are very similar characters in similar settings, to appeal to new Loki/Hiddleston fans. Apparently it worked.

Perry Constantine: This wasn't so much something I learned from a specific strategy, but more what I've learned from a combination of things. Have a purpose behind each promotion. If you want to get people hooked on a series, then don't start a free run before the second book is available. And when that second book is available, you'd better have a preview and a buy link of that second book at the end of the first. If your goal is to get reviews, make sure you include a note at the end of that book politely asking for reviews and providing a link where those reviews can be posted. Make sure your covers are branded appropriately so that they can be identified as being part of the same series. That can mean using the same cover artist for each book, making sure each book has the same style of cover, or even having a unifying series logo. And also, maintain productivity. Today's readers are really in love with series, but what they love even more is an active series. If they see a series being promoted with book one and book two and book two came out three years ago, they might be a bit more adverse to trying that series given that it appears dormant.

Susan Burdorf: Marketing strategies are so reliant on the author themselves and their fan base that it is hard to really suggest any one thing and point to it as a success or failure. I do know that Boxed Sets are the "thing" right now according to Mark Coker of Smashwords. But once that fad stops being popular I am sure someone else will come up with something else equally as successful. I think that some of the things that indie authors like to do as far as trying to work the numbers is to be part of someone else's book release as a guest author where they get to promote their book, play a game or two in the hour or half hour they are allowed to be spotlighted, and offer amazon or other gift cards to participants. That seems to work really well.

Mandi M. Lynch: Just dumping flyers on a flyer table does not work. Engaging people helps for a relationship and people show interest because of that.

Just how effective can a cheap or low-investment be in the long run? What kind of return on investment can one expect using cheap or free promotion services on the Web?

J.H. Glaze: Most of the cheap or free marketing services on the web have been overrun with self published authors. As a result, services which used to get great results for a low investment, have tripled their prices over the last 2 years and waiting lists are extremely long.

Here is an example: 18 months ago I could promote one of my horror novels through BookBub.com to about 600k people for about $45. Today, to reach the same number of folks costs $110 for a one day promo run, but here is the catch – that price is only if you are promoting a book that is on sale from full price to a free giveaway for a limited time. The price goes up it you have only discounted the book. Here is the link to their rate sheet: https://www.bookbub.com/partners/pricing
Here are some things to remember when doing paid promos:

• If you only have 1 book available, the only reason to do a paid promo for a free book is to try to get reviews. !0,000 downloads will result in 2 reviews if you are lucky.
• If you have a series of two or more books, giving book 2 in the series as a free download will result in a boost in sales of book 1. I believe it is because people don’t like to start with book 2. I have had that proven time and again. If you give away book 1, sales of book 2 are minimal at best.
• It takes money to make money, but you don’t want to throw your money away. Before you use a service, post in a forum and ask if anyone has used it before, and what kind of results to expect from it.
• Sales results from promos can be genre specific. I am a horror author. Romance authors can expect to pay a lot more for their promo, because a larger percentage of the market tend to read romance.
• Word of mouth is the most powerful marketing. If you can get people to read it, review it, comment on it on pages, and tell their friends about it you are good to go. The only way to do this is to write awesome fucking books!

John Hartness: Marketing yourself can be cheap and effective, but there is no magic bullet. There’s no “do this and you’ll sell a ton of books.” Most bestsellers have no idea what they did to catch lightning in the bottle. If editors knew which books would be huge hits, they’d only buy the books that would be huge hits. It’s all a gamble. But by using the cheap and free self-promotion tools like MailChimp, Wordpress, Twitter, Facebook and others, you can create an impact and get enough eyeballs on your work to make a difference.

Iscah: That's tricky. Some of my highest investment attempts this year yielded the fewest results, while one event that cost me only a bit of time and gasoline yielded my highest sales for a weekend. Budget is something to keep in mind, but targeting is more important. Know (or get to know) your audience, and make it as easy as possible for the potential buyer to get to where they can purchase your book.

Mat Nastos: Biggest lesson is to know what and how to promote to my various channels. To know that promoting a freebie sale to my social channels is not smart. Each channel you've got - web, social networks, email list, etc - has its own requirements and needs in terms of what/how you sell. Not knowing how to make use of those things will cost you sales. It's sort of like people on Twitter who retweet when someone does a #FF with their name...makes no sense -- you're asking people who already follow you to follow you...Same principal with marketing.

I spent the first month or so marketing the wrong message to the wrong channel.

The other thing I learned was the effectiveness of a proper roll out for my promotions. Learning how to do a build up before a promotion and then what to do to maintain traction once a promotion was over. Making sure I didn't shoot my wad by marketing everything all at once. You can waste a lot of time and resources that way, and miss out on sales.I like promotion like I like my women: cheap and easy. Free is even better. Everything I've done in terms of marketing (from way back in my days doing affiliate marketing until now) has focused on that free or cheap side of the scale. There are enough spots on the web, if planned out correctly, that you can make a pretty big impact using them. It's all about planning, timing, and implementation. Knowing when and how to roll out that free/cheap promotion is the biggest key to success.

The effectiveness comes down to planning. Set your goal and then put your plan together to meet that goal.

Frank Fradella: Check your watch and mark the date, because the advice you'll receive on this point will alter drastically from one year to the next. Right now? A good strategy (if you have a back catalogue of books in a single series) is to give away the first book as an ebook to drive sales to the rest of the series. But before you talk about how much money to spend (or not spend) on marketing, you absolutely must be able to identify your target market with pinpoint accuracy. You need to know their age, their gender, their average income, their spending habits... everything. If you can do that, you can get your product in front of them much more effectively.

Van Allen Plexico: A $19 Twitter ad got me 800 downloads of LUCIAN and 800 downloads of Sentinels: When Strikes the Warlord in a single day each.

Perry Constantine: It can be very effective, provided it's targeted at the right audience. And to veer slightly off the point of the question, this is why every writer needs an email list. It's the cheapest, most-effective marketing tool. Even when compared to more costly services it's still the most-effective tool in the long run. BookBub may get you several thousand downloads on a free book, but if you don't have an email list, you've basically put the cash you spent into a big pile and set fire to it. Those readers are not going to remember your name.

And yet, so many writers I know do not have an email list. Why? It's so simple to set up and most services allow you to start free (ReachMail is free for up to 5000 subscribers, MailChimp is free up to I believe 2500).

Beyond that, you need a web presence—and no, that does not mean Facebook and Twitter. You need a dedicated website, and no, that does not mean a yourname.wordpress.com or yourname.blogspot.com site. It means yourname.com. And yes, this costs money, but if you want to be serious about making a living as a writer, then you need to treat it like a business and not a hobby. And businesses require investment. And it's not like this is a massive expense. I have a site with Bluehost that costs me $140 for three years, plus $15 a year for a domain name. That's about $5 a month for a website. If you can't spare $5 a month, then you're clearly not taking this thing seriously. Get a website and if it's a Wordpress site, then install a free plugin called MyBookTable so you can list all your titles in your catalog easily.

A website and a mailing list are the two cheapest investments an indie author can make, and they are the two that will serve you best in the long run. Especially with rumors that Facebook is going to require all ads be paid in the future. So the days of posting links to your books in five dozen Facebook groups are not going to last (and if we're being honest, it was always the least effective marketing you could do). Invest in a website and get a mailing list.

Susan Burdorf: I think it depends on what your goal is. If you go cheap that does not mean you cannot make it classy. At book fairs or signings a lot of authors are just trying to collect emails with which they can create a fan base they can then send information on book releases, cover reveals, next book signings, etc and that is good. Some offer "gifts" to reward their fans (Paperwhites, Kindles, Nooks, large Amazon cards). You just have to make it fun for the folks. To encourage people to come to my tables at book signings I will offer a free "gift" which is usually something I hand make (I quilt, make jewelry, etc so for me I can do something that costs me almost nothing because I already have the supplies at home).

In conclusion my advice is this: whatever marketing strategy you employ just make sure it will not cause you to go bankrupt either financially or emotionally. And ALWAYS treat your readers and fans with respect. Even if they do not treat you the same way.

Mandi M. Lynch: It depends on the investment. A blog guest post with links is free and will hang around forever. $10 worth of cheap black and white flyers generates a lot of trash.

Frank Fradella on "Don't Suck"

Back in 1999, I started an online magazine for superhero fiction that was, in those heady days of the internet’s infancy, the first and only one of its kind. The magazine went on to do great things, including winning the Writer’s Digest Grand Prize in their first ever Zine Publishing Awards, and landed me a gig on their Zine Advisory Board, helping to shape the future of electronic publishing.

It also — and I don’t think I’m exaggerating here — launched a few careers, including my own. Just a year later I would go on to sign a six-book deal and a few of the fine folks who saw publication in our digital pages are now doing fine, fine works for much larger houses.

Today, Sean Taylor, one of my right hand men, and the first to truly believe in what I was doing, wrote a post about two simple words I had included as a rider in our submission guidelines.

Don’t suck.

That was it. That simple. The rest of the sub guides were what you’d expect — story length, format, style notes, don’t blow up Cleveland. You know. The usual.

But those two words added at the end were simple. I wasn't being funny. I wasn't being coy. I was receiving dozens of submissions every week and every story I bought came out of my pocket. And I bought every single good story that came my way.

Read the full article: https://medium.com/@frankfradella/dont-suck-a0c728b77ac8

Your Character is Your Contract with the Reader

We've talked quite a bit here on the blog about building and developing great characters in our stories, but we've not quite sliced it this way before. So, at the suggestion of one of our readers (and one of my writing mentors), this week let's talk about how we honor the contract we have with our readers in terms of our characters and how they interact with our stories. 

Characters are met in an instance but defined over time. As such, how do you remain true to your character as he or she or it (and you!) encounter the various twists and turns of a story?

Peter Welmerink: Character and plot need to weave about each other and grow together. Both need to develop simultaneously to maintain the readers curiosity, retention and draw to both. Having a great character in a stale plot line, or vice versa, will kill a story for me. You don't need both punching you in the face the whole time vying for your unwavering attention, but there needs to be that give-a-shit factor with both or I, like anyone else, will simply put down the book and move on to something else.

Lance Stahlberg: There's an interesting balancing act that goes on in telling a good story. Readers get invested in characters. Characters are what will drive your story and keep your readers coming back. Character is king. That said, focusing a story entirely on a character runs the risk of getting boring fast. They need to be involved in an interesting plot. Character-driven stories tend to come off as pretentious to me. So you ideally are going for a plot-driven story with a solid, memorable character to follow through events.

So here's the trick, which gets closer to answering your questions here: Characters have to be flexible. They must be solid enough to engage readers, but they have to be adaptable to those twists and turns you want to throw at them without screwing up your narrative. You stay true to them above all else by getting into their heads.

Mark Koch: Character comes first and foremost. They are the life to the setting and what makes a story something other than a beautiful photograph, whatever the medium.

Ellie Raine: My version of “remaining true” to a character is kind of hard to explain. I usually write in a first person perspective, so in regards to the narrating character, I sort of shift my personality during the writing. My way of thinking changes, my morals change (only for these sessions), and my history/childhood/upbringing changes. So in a sense, I’m not me when I’m writing. I’m that character. If something dramatic happens to them, the gears turning my brain are synced with theirs. Whatever their instant, knee jerk reaction to that situation is, that is what I feel "rings true” for them.

Though, for the characters surrounding the narrator (or those in 3rd person), I pretend that I’m observing my friends (or strangers I’ve encountered) during those dramatic events in the story. If my mind isn’t in the story, or if it is shoved out during the writing, then that’s a red-flag for me. If I’m thrust out of the story and am reminded that I’m writing it, that tells me the characters probably wouldn’t be reacting this way—and I try again with a different reaction.

Selah Janel: I think it’s important to remember where a character starts at, but to also allow room for growth. I’ve changed considerably over the years, so it’s unfair for me to think I can dictate everything blow by blow for a character. If something comes up that I initially didn’t plan on for that person, I’ve learned to embrace it because it’ll often make a story better.

Percival Constantine: Character is key. You have to know your character more intimately than you know your significant other, your parents, your children, etc.

Dave Creek: Depending upon the particular problem, you could go in the other direction -- take the story in a new direction based upon who your character has become. That might even lead you down a path you never would have thought of otherwise.

Logan Masterson: The world itself can often provide guidance, too. Especially with genre fiction, antagonists are free to provide all kinds of interference. Then there are geography, weather, and a bazillion other variables at our fingertips. Lastly, there are subplots. Not only do they round out characters, but they can guide them too. Subplots should intertwine with the main plot, and leading a character toward the goal is probably the best way to do that.

What do you do when you face that moment when you must chose between character and advancing the plot, when one seems to be a forced fit onto or into the other?

Ellie Raine: It depends on the plot points before this moment. If I write out those points on a whiteboard and see that I have too much characterization already, I will try to focus more on plot. If there is too much plot and not enough characterization, I will focus on character.

Percival Constantine: That's simple—you change your plot. This is why I keep my plot outlines somewhat free and loose, so I have freedom to change them if the character changes in ways that I didn't take into account when writing that plot.

Mark Koch: Well defined characters don't have to be so rigid in that definition as to be unbending. Hit something rigid hard enough and you will find that it will dent or crack. Those moments are some of the best moments in character development -- when we see that the characters have depth and more dimension than the sound bite voice over.

H. David Blalock: Okay, I'm going to just put this out there and say this is my opinion and you know what they say about opinions.

Story-telling has gone from simply telling a story to the tale having to be riddled with "relateable" people. Since the advent of soap-opera fiction, readers have changed in their expectations towards identification with the players. Readers want to inhabit the hero (or the villain, depending on the reader's character). However, character development is part of the plot. It shouldn't be a problem to have the character react differently than expected as long as the progressive growth of the character itself is plausible. 

Most every story relates a change in a character from one state to another, whether through conflict or epiphany. As such, all characters should act "out of character" at least once as an expression of that growth. The magnitude of that odd behavior should define the level of radical growth the character experiences. 

In other words, if a character must act "out of character" to forward the plot (and the writer doesn't want to completely abandon the storyline) then the character must adapt. Plot advancement trumps character action.

Marian Allen: If there's a conflict between what you need the character to do and what the character WOULD do as you've developed her, and you absolutely can't get some other character to do the thing or reshape the plot, then you need to sit down and pretend you're having a heart-to-heart with your character. "Why would you do this thing? It seems so unlike you." Eventually, you come up with a wrinkle in the character that makes the thing INEVITABLY what she would do. Then you make a note of it and go back and iron that wrinkle into the fabric of what came before.

Lance Stahlberg: There is a metaphysical aspect to writing. Instead of just being a puppeteer and making your creations do whatever you want, you have to give them life. You know that you need the plot to move from A to B and somehow get to C. But when your character is confronted with a situation where you need them to go one way, but they refuse because it would go against their nature, the character wins every time.

It's now your job to figure out how to get things back on track. There's a lot you can do to finagle events to move things where you want them to go, but not quite as much when it comes to characters, once they are established.

Selah Janel: I stop and think very carefully about why I’m trying to choose one over the other. For me, they go hand in hand…a character is either reacting to the plot in an authentic way, or the way they act move the plot forward. For me, personally, if I come to a point where I’m in crisis, it’s usually because I’m trying to force something to happen and it’s either not being translated right by the characters or it’s just the wrong thing to happen. On the flip side, I may think up new ideas mid-manuscript and stop to rehaul everything because it’s a better idea than what I’d initially planned. I have to be very honest with myself at times – am I writing something that’s best for the manuscript for that character, or am I going slightly AU because I’m amused and it’s what I want to read? Is there some way to combine the two to preserve what I like but still move things forward and stay true to the character?

A friend of mine once said that "making the character perform an action that runs contrary to his or her character just to move the plot forward is a betrayal of the trust of the reader." Agree or disagree? Why?

Frank Fradella: Witness The Mummy 2. In the first film, the entire plot is driven by the love of two people -- Imhotep and Anuck Su-Namun. Without that backbone, you have no story. By the time the second film comes around, they have both proven their love over and over again, even winning against death itself.

And yet at the end of The Mummy 2, when the stone temple is crashing down around them, Anuck Su-Namun gets scared and leaves Imhotep to die?

I call bullshit. The entire story hinged on that relationship, and they threw it away in an effort to make the "heroes" look better. THAT was a betrayal of the characters. I was very, VERY angry with them over that."

Logan Masterson: Characters can sometimes frustrate us, and never moreso than when they refuse to stick to the script. I, for one, am always looking at ways to subtly influence my players to keep them in line, but I'm pretty good at it. Characterization is just natural for me. I pay close attention to each major character's known and unknown motivations. I sometimes do mindmaps of these relationships. Then, I can use other characters to nudge a contrarian in the right direction.

Selah Janel: A little of both. I think yes, you have to be careful to not let your personal interest control the character in a way that the reader is going to find disheartening…..but at the end of the day you are the author. You’re the one with the pen. It’s your idea. I think it’s also slightly dangerous to be writing with the intent of giving people what they want, especially if that’s not true to your original (or slightly altered, even) vision. It’s just as dangerous to pander as it is to try to force a character to do something that isn’t necessarily in their wheelhouse, in my opinion. If the plot needs to move, it needs to move – that may mean stopping and taking extra time to rework the plot, it may mean taking time to rework a character or redefine what that character’s actions might be, but I also feel that worrying too much about what readers are going to think is something that will compromise the end product, as well.

Ellie Raine: Again, this depends. If there was a strong reason for the character to go against his usual behavior, then I’m more likely to accept it. But if there is no explanation, I will forever question why a character did something so unexpected and irrational (according to their established personality).

Mark Koch: If you have to force a character forward or into a situation or action contrary to their dictates as they are defined- be true to those dictates regardless. Have them react accordingly. Force them, by means of outside influences or fate, but then keep them honest by expressing anger, or outrage, or sadness, or irritation and defiance. At the very least, give a window to some guilt or shame afterwards depending upon what the plot requires.

If someone walked up to you or me and compelled either of us to do something we would not choose to do- we'd have a predictable reaction. If it was truly contrary, that reaction might even create an opportunity for a new plot point or story of its own. Revenge. Redemption. Regret.

Percival Constantine: Agree completely. This is why I think it's important to have flexibility in your plot. I was a huge fan of the TV show How I Met Your Mother, yet the series finale was one of the worst endings I'd ever seen in any medium. To the creators' credit, they had a fixed ending in mind, something that doesn't often happen in TV and especially not in sitcoms. But over the course of the show's nine-year run, the characters evolved and that original ending no longer made sense. Yet the creators still insisted on using it and the result was an incoherent mess that betrayed the trust of the viewers. 

Jay Wilburn: If the character doesn't fit the action and being forced into committing the action can't be explained by the circumstance or some change in the character, then the story outline is wrong. The course of events needs to be rethought to fit the world and characters you created. It may only be a small adjustment in the end. It might be a different journey than you expected to the same destination. It might be a different story than the one you originally thought you were writing. As you need to be ready to kill your characters, you also need to be ready to kill your original story outline when it has outlived its usefulness.

Lance Stahlberg: Wholeheartedly agree. A reader will notice characters acting out character faster than they will notice a supposed plot hole. They can be pretty forgiving of the latter if you keep the characters enjoyable.

At what point, if any, does the reader's need supercede that of the storyteller? Is there a time when it becomes more important to move plot forward "come hell or high water"?

Lance Stahlberg: Never. If you can't move your story forward in a way that keeps your characters consistent, then either your plot sucks, or your character sucks. Or maybe just the corner you wrote yourself into sucks. Both the plot outline and the characters have to be malleable enough to get through those rough patches.

I mean, there are ways to get away with a character being forced to act in a way they normally might not want to. Heat of the moment, stress under pressure, an impossible choice with no “right” answer, false perception at odds with what's actually happening. Or maybe a core trait of the character is that they are unpredictable. But there always has to be some way to reconcile what a character does with who they are. Always. At minimum, you have to acknowledge in the narration or inner dialogue that they acted oddly, which you could always explore later. But never ignore it.

Mark Koch: Storytelling gives your character lemons because the plot has to advance? Have them do something with them, be it make lemonade or curse the lemons and grind them under their heel.

Great characters don't appear to be directed in the story, they appear to be reacting to it as it unfolds. Give them choices that are true to who they are- even if they don't get choices in the outcome they can always choose their inward or outward reaction.

Dave Creek: You can take the character anywhere you want her to go as long as you motivate that action. It may take going backwards and putting in the motivator earlier in the story.

Ellie Raine: The only time I can justify sacrificing character development for plot is when a reader is half way (or sometimes near the end) of the book and still doesn’t know where the hell it’s going. I’ve read too many books that only cared about developing characters, and so went entire stories staying in the exact same place with little plot advancement. But on the other hand, I’ve read a few books where they didn’t give a damn about character development, and I ended up not caring about the characters at all.

Percival Constantine: Never. Characters can change and grow over time so they shouldn't be stagnant, but at the same time that change has to be visible. A character who was once a paragon of virtue and honesty in chapter one can't suddenly be a lying, back-stabbing bastard in chapter ten without any reason for that change. If you get to a point where you have to move the plot in a way that is contrary to your character, then you need to change the plot or go back and see where you went wrong with that character's development.

Selah Janel: I worry about moving plot forward on a schedule more with shorts or anthology calls than I do individual projects. That being said, I do think you have to keep a balance in pacing the plot and everything else. That being said, there’s no reason why they shouldn’t work together. Plot needs character and character needs plot. It really also comes down to show don’t tell –- this is where you need to figure out ways to showcase your characterizations as quickly or succinctly as possible to keep the story rolling while still being true to your cast.