Tag Archives: writing life

A guest post by Mary Villalba

The monster looms. The “to-do” list is long and the day short. Armed with coffee and good intentions I begin to tick off tasks. The pile before me like the Sorcerer’s brooms inexplicably grows. By noon, I have managed to lob off more than just those items listed, but I have also laid down another twenty to fill the space between noon and eleven pm, when I will fall exhausted, but satisfied, into bed looking back on the day with pride in my productive behavior!

The problem? The have-to list crowds out the want-to list. I want to do a final edit on my first novel and fine tune the synopsis. I want to sell millions of copies of my book. I want to post “author” legitimately on my FaceBook profile. Why can’t I?

Another writer and lecturer whom I greatly admire, Barbara Sher, came up with the term “resistance”, which pretty much sums it up. What is it that creates resistance to doing the things you want to do? As an overachieving, type-A personality I have gone through my own life determinedly setting goals up on fence posts and shooting them off. At twelve I determined that I would live in the most exclusive neighborhood in Denver; at twenty-nine I moved in to the house I built there. When it became clear to me that there was a great need for services for the hearing impaired in third world countries a doctor and I created the World Hearing Network, which is today the most successful outreach program for the hearing impaired in the world. I decided the Rocky Mountain District of Kiwanis should have a female governor at the helm, and became the first female elected to the position in eighty-five years. The ridiculously long list of accomplishments goes on and on. It should be easy for me to apply the same ambition to my writing, but it isn’t. So, as much as I hate to be introspective, it must be time for me to look at why I am holding myself back.

Yes, I am the reason I have not overcome the monster inertia. We, I, reach plateaus where the level of risk and reward become just about even. I don’t anticipate a greater reward for my writing than there is risk in exposing my inner-self and my writing to others; so I stop. I suppose that if there was a champion cheering me on with a contract for a million books I might be more motivated to take a chance on myself. Risk versus reward. Ah ha! In the rest of my life I create my own rewards, but when it comes to writing I can’t envision a real world reward coming my way.

Crawling back into my head and rummaging around I see the box labeled “get a job”. When I open it up it contains letters from parents who grew up pre-depression era. They want me to set concrete goals and they want me to be realistic about what I can and cannot do. The letters indicate they don’t think I can live in the neighborhood I picked, they don’t think I can build my dream empire, but, wait………I did! They were not my champions, I was my own champion.

In my mind, I set that box on fire and sweep the ashes out of my head.

Hmmmm; now what? See the problem, solve the problem, move on! Eureka! I can approach writing the same way I have approached every other goal in my life. So, today, right now, at the top of my to-do list I have written “finish synopsis.” It will get done today, because I will give myself a reward for getting the task done and because the risk of negative feedback burned up in the mental box I’d been carrying around for the last sixty-five years!

Take a look in your own attic and see what you can clean out! Then get to work!! You have a lot to accomplish and I, for one, will be your champion! I believe in you and know you can do it!! And, BTW, I’m posting “author” on my FaceBook profile right now!

Guest Writer Bio:
“It’s about time” is a good description for taking up novel writing at her age! Mary started writing stories and poetry when she was about six years old, and over fifty years of her professional life as a real estate broker and owner of her own strategic marketing company she has used language as a communication tool, even holding press credentials, but writing a novel was beyond her wildest dreams. It was a group of inspired writers half her age who threw her off the cliff and into the waters of authorship. She is very grateful they didn’t stop to ask her if she knew how to swim!

Breaking Into The Next Level Of Craft

September 2, 2013

Frank Morin

We all know the journey to becoming a professional writer is a long one. It takes a while to “Break In”, and no two writers ever seem to take the exact same path to get there. New writers are told to keep working, be persistent, and they’ll get there.

It’s like dropping off an inexperienced climber at the base of a challenging mountain and telling them to just start climbing, and eventually they’ll make it to the top.

But there are trails on a mountain, easier paths marked by those who have gone on before. True, but someone who knows next to nothing about mountain climbing can still easily get lost. Same for writers. There is lots of help available, but sometimes we don’t know enough to know what’s missing when we get stuck.

Climbing a mountain is done in stages, and one thing that comes as a shock to some new writers is that becoming a professional writer is similar. We don’t Break In just once. There are levels to craft, plateaus we reach on our journey. Sometimes we get stuck there, unable to Break In to the next level and resume the climb up toward the ultimate goal.

Throughout the month of September, we are going to explore some of these writing plateaus where we’ve been stuck, and ways we’ve found to pass the barrier and Break In to the next level of craft.

Sometimes we need a mentor, a writing group, or an unusually honest loved one to tell us we can do better. When I decided to pick up writing several years ago, I pounded out 70 pages in one weekend and thought, “I’m on my way!” My wife read those initial chapters and said, “I don’t like your protagonist.”

She was right. He didn’t work. First obstacle.

Thankfully the answer to that one was straight-forward. Swallow pride, throw away thousands of words of crap for the first (of many) time, and start again.

Sometimes we need a seminar or a conference or a book on writing to illuminate the shadows and show us a couple steps forward down the path. We might need to arrange our schedule better to find more time to write.

And sometimes we just need to write another hundred thousand words of crap before we get it.

In the end, we all hit multiple plateaus, or ruts that block our forward progress. But we don’t have to stay there.

This month the shared wisdom and experience of the entire group will help map out some possible routes to reach the next plateau.

Franchises: Buying In for the Long Haul

August 22, 2013

Nathan Barra

Marketing Nathan Barra The Writing Life 1 Comment

I remember reviews of the Wii that compared it to the Xbox 360 and the PS3, when all three consoles were shiny and new. From a technical perspective, the Wii was an inferior console. It lacked entirely in capabilities that its competitors were counting on as differentiating selling points. Like millions of others, I still bought a Wii. In fact, the Wii sold so well that it dominated the competition for a number of years after its release. Why would a technically inferior console do so well?

Loyalty.

Nintendo holds a number of huge franchises that have always released a installment shortly after a new system’s release. On IGN’s top 25 Videogame Franchises list, Nintendo franchises occupy the top two spots (Mario and the Legend of Zelda) and a handful of the remaining twenty three spots.

Authorial franchises start with a series. With enough time, and if enough quality works are produced, the author’s name becomes the franchise, instead. Even one series with the popularity of one of Nintendo’s flagship franchises, the Legend of Zelda as an example, is enough to build a very successful career on. The question is, then, what can we learn from Zelda’s success?

#5. Successful franchises are cannon controlled.

To the best of my investigative skills, there has been neither a third party production of a Legend of Zelda game, nor a Legend of Zelda game produced for any system other than a Nintendo console since Nintendo started producing hardware. Why would the license holder of such a huge franchise do this? Isn’t Nintendo limiting their potential audience by not offering the game on PC or it’s competitor’s consoles? The answer is two-fold.

First, Nintendo does not want anyone other than Miyamoto and Tezuka (the games’ designers) working on the franchise, lest they muddle the cannon. The current prevailing theories as to the canonical timeline suggest at least three independent time streams. This milieu and wealth of plot is too complicated for anyone else to handle. One bad game, like one bad book, risks the entire franchise. As to the second point, a gamer must do business with Nintendo’s hardware branch to play a Legend of Zelda game. By limiting the availability of the game, Nintendo increases the profitability of all of its branches.

The Take Away: Upon establishing a successful series or franchise, it is essential to recognize the power of the IP represented therein. I need to be very, very careful who I allow to work on it and how it is distributed.

#4. Successful franchises use iconic imagery.

To me, the Triforce is indelibly linked to the whole Legend of Zelda series. When I see that symbol, my mind automatically goes back to the games and how much fun I had playing them. And you know, doesn’t those three golden triangles mean that this game is also a Zelda game? Maybe I should stop walking through the mall and pay attention to that cutout in the window of the game store.

Point being, the Triforce is an excellent branding piece for several reasons. First, it is strongly tied into the series, serving as a major focus for no less than six of the Zelda games. It appears as a design element in many of the other installments of the series. It’s a simple design that can be easily printed, embroidered, cast or otherwise incorporated into merchandise. I am able to recognize it from across a crowded game store. That’s some good branding.

The Take Away: If used properly, brands let me market my books, sell merch, and establish and communicate a reputation at a glance.

#3. Successful franchises inspire nostalgia.

The basic premise of a Zelda game is that a young boy from a rural village in Hyrule is called to save the world and sets out to explore a number of dungeons, killing monsters and collecting loot, until he faces off and defeats the ultimate evil of his time. It’s a Hero’s Journey, every time. Each game feels the same, and has the elements of puzzles and monster combat that I enjoy. The familiarity is comforting. Yet, there is enough variety in the storyline, treasures and items to collect, and milieu to explore, that it still feels fresh. The learning curve from one game to the next is shallow.

Nostalgia also has value in that it can generate sales. I remember, very fondly, my first game of the Majora’s Mask. Because I enjoyed that game, I bought and played the Ocarina of Time, which I also enjoyed. Each subsequent game has built up the nostalgic warm and fuzzies that I have for the Zelda franchise. The release of a new Zelda game has pushed me off the fence about buying a new console before.

The Take Away: Nostalgia is a powerful position from which to sell books. If a consumer looks at my name at the bottom of a new release, and is flooded with a sense of nostalgic enjoyment, the book is likely sold.

#2. Successful franchises have staying power.

The Hero’s Journey is one of the essential story archetypes that speaks to the human condition. It has resonated with people for thousands of years and continues to do so. I want to start the game with Link and gain power enough to kill the ultimate evil of the day. I can play, and read, that storyline over and over again, and never get bored so long as there is enough variety in other aspects.

Wise selection of archetypes is not the only element that can give staying power to a series. One of my favorite things about a Legend of Zelda game is the underlying philosophy that serves as the theme for the game. In Majora’s Mask, the world is destroyed at the end of the third in-game day, so you are forced to time travel back to the dawn of the first day repeatedly. Whenever I play this game as an adult, I can’t help but ruminate afterwards about the nature of time, how I live my life and what I would do over if I had the chance. In the Twilight Princess, the game focuses on the concept of twilight as the border of light and dark, and this imagery is dragged throughout the game’s other aspects. To me, this speaks to the idea that the world is both bright and dark, and that, most of the time, we live in a world of moral greys.

The Take Away: There isn’t one method to give staying power to a series, but it is essential for a series to have the endurance to become a successful franchise, none the less.

#1. Successful franchises have consistently high quality.

I didn’t start at the beginning of the Zelda franchise. I started with Majora’s Mask, then went backwards in the release chronology. I then follow the series to this day. If Majora’s Mask had been the one bad game in the series, I would have done neither. There are some other franchises which I started from the beginning, but ended up dropping mid-series due to a single bad installment. When I build a franchise, what I’m really doing is building a brand, and for that brand to continue living, I must be sure that I deliver quality work, every time.

The Take Away: If I’m disappointed by the quality of a single installment, I may not come back. Franchises trade on their name and upon garnered authorial trust.

Lovin’ Every Minute of it

May 29, 2013

Frank Morin

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I’ve really enjoyed the posts this month – the insights into the history and motivation behind why we’ve all chosen such a difficult, time-consuming, and not-yet lucrative focus for our time. This month provided a rare opportunity for self-reflection, for looking back, and for reminding myself why I enjoy writing so much.

I love a good story.

It all boils down to that. As early as third grade, I began devouring books way above my grade level in search for great stories. I read widely, but gravitated toward science fiction and fantasy, reveling in foreign worlds, alien technology, and boundless magic. Many of the great stories mentioned this month are ones I enjoyed too, but I thought I’d mention a couple of other favorites from my early days as an avid reader.

First there’s the classic Sword of Shannara, epic fantasy from before it was clear what made classic epic fantasy. It’s one of the early greats ones. It had everything: the mysterious, powerful mentor; the young hero hopelessly in over his head; the faithful sidekick; the experienced fighter friend; and an ancient evil no one really expected anyone could defeat. It also included spectacular battle sequences, terrifying monsters, magical talismans, and memorable moments of wonder and horror. What’s not to love? Many of the sequels were good, but for me, none of them surpassed the parent story.

Another of my all-time favorite series was The Mallorean by David Eddings. The magic system was fairly simple, yet consistent, and the world well-developed. Most importantly, the characters were awesome. I loved how they interacted, how they each had a distinct voice, how even the minor characters had some interesting arcs, and important roles to play. For me, this was a series that showed how to manage and utilize a big cast of characters.

There are many other stories I still cherish to this day, but these are a couple of classics that helped cement my love of fantasy. I read so much, it became a problem in school and at home. However, it wasn’t until I started role-playing games that I really started recognizing I had a talent for spinning my own tales.

As a youth, I played a spin-off version of D&D with brothers and friends that minimized the use of dice (everything was done with a single die), and focused more on the crafting of great adventures. Through that effort, I soon discovered I had a flair for inventing great stories, for adapting quickly on the fly, and holding a group’s interest.

It was about that time that I started writing my own stories in earnest. In high school, I plotted out a couple of complete novels, although I never finished writing any of those ginormous epics. I wrote many short stories, some of which were actually pretty good. At that time, I knew I wanted to be a writer, to craft long, epic tales that would thrill me, and hopefully a few readers too.

Unfortunately, I went to college and fell in love with computers, which were just becoming mainstream, and shifted focus to become a computer programmer. That’s what became my career, what supported my family for over a decade until the desire, the need, to write began consuming me again.

Now I write as much as I can, and I’ve arranged my schedule to allow more time to write. I’ve written and thrown away well over half a million words, and have completed three novels and a novella that are viable properties. It’s a long road to become a competent writer, but it’s a road I’ve loved. Soon I hope to reach the next big milestone: publishing something, but that’s a different topic.

And I still play role-playing games, now with my kids and their friends. I still find it one of the best ways to exercise my creative muscles, to keep my mind sharp, nimble, and focused on what’s important in stories. It helps me stay in tune with what makes stories fun.

Because a fun story is a good story.