Tag Archives: Writing

Characters Across Genres

Posted on March 14, 2011 | 1 comment

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Often I am asked, “What’s your favorite genre to write?”

And often I reply, “Um. All of them!”

It’s a completely honest answer. My first published novel, released this past summer, is of the spy genre. The next book, slated for June, is a dystopian. Fantasy was the genre of the first long story I ever completed (writing with my sister, good memories). An Oregon Trail journal turned into a seventy-page piece in sixth grade. In my writing thus far I’ve also dabbled in ghost, school, contemporary, perhaps gritty (I say perhaps because I’m still not sure what that means, Google refuses to clear it up for me—perhaps I should try Bing?), murder mystery, and sibling stories.

While I know some authors prefer to stick to one or a few related genres, I enjoyed different aspects of all of them and had equal fun while writing. Therefore, the first time someone asked me about genres—a reporter for my school newspaper—led me to spend about an hour and a half in deep contemplation. (The alternative was math homework, so it worked out.) I came to the conclusion I placed more value in the characters of a story than the genre, or even the plot. The plot, to me, is a device to portray characters. My characters are the personalities I slip into or interact with (fictionally), and I work a plot around them, creating believable and changed people by “The End.” Plus, the characters supply dialogue, description, action…the plot wouldn’t happen without them!

Because the plot is a tool my characters use to propel themselves to the last page, the genre is also a secondary matter. If my characters fit best into a ghost story because one feels guilty over the death of another, then a ghost story it is. If another set of characters need disguises and secrets to best be themselves, I formulate a spy story. If the characters in my mind are best suited for overcoming severe societal challenges and barriers not yet in existence, we create a dystopia.

So, in essence, I’m not sure which genre is my favorite—or maybe all of them are, because until my next character shows up in my mind calling out, “Idea! Idea! I have an idea!!!” I don’t even know what my next genre will be.

Kieryn

www.kierynnicolas.com

http://twitter.com/KierynNicolas

http://www.kierynnicolas.blogspot.com/

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Posted in Blatherings, Creativity, Guest Bloggers, Writing

Tagged author, authors, books, characters, dystopia, ebooks, Echelon Press, editing, fiction, ideas, kieryn nicolas, publishing, quake, rain, readers, reading, writers, Writing

Writers Marketing Group Blog Exchange

Posted on March 10, 2011 | 2 comments

If you aren’t Stephen King or Nora Roberts, chances are you’ll have to do much of your own promotional work on your own dime. More and more authors are saving their dimes and scheduling blog book tours. Some authors pay other people to arrange these things while others, like me and quite a few of my friends, arrange our own. The difficult part is finding new websites to guest blog once you’ve hammered away a few times at each of your friends’ websites!

Knowing that most authors run into this same predicament, I thought it might be a good idea to create a community where writers can network for the purpose of guest blogging and learning how to promote themselves inexpensively and cooperatively.

That community is called the Writers Marketing Group (http://writersmarketinggroup.com/). Several free services will be available to authors through this program. The first one is The Writers Marketing Group Blog Exchange (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/WMGBlogExchange/).

The Writers Marketing Group Blog Exchange is a database of participating writers who are willing to host guest bloggers on a one-for-one exchange (you host them on your blog one day and they host you on their blog one day). This means no more wasting time hunting for new venues to guest blog when you have a new book release or taking precious writing time to seek out new authors to guest blog on your site when you need them. There are no fees, no charge to register, and you can use the database as much as you like.

I hope you’ll consider joining The Writers Marketing Group Blog Exchange and help me spread the word to other writers – No matter what genre, from YA to erotica, we’ve got it covered. While it is a Yahoo group, it is not a discussion list that will fill your mailbox or suck up your time. I send a maximum of one email per week with guest blogging tips and special guest blogging opportunities passed on by members. Just think of it as a really big tool in your promotional toolbox.

Please join now by going to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/WMGBlogExchange/

Thanks for your time!

Lisa Pietsch
Follow my blog at http://www.LisaPietsch.com
Seven Souls-a-Leapingis now available from Sapphire Blue Publishing
Join the Writers Marketing Group Blog Exchange!

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Posted in Blatherings, Guest Bloggers, Just for Fun, Marketing, Writing

Tagged author, authors, Bloggers, blogging, blogs, books, publishing, readers, reading, sales, writers, Writing

Why Would You Do That? (Guest Blog: Marian Allen)

Posted on February 28, 2011 | 5 comments

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I like a good piece of literary fiction as much as the next person, and better than a lot of next persons, depending on who the next person is. But come on.

Any fiction–literary or genre–needs to do certain things:

Have characters who do things for reasons that make sense to them. The reasons don’t have to make sense to the reader, but they have to–believably–make sense to the characters.
Have a plot arc with a beginning, a middle and an end. The plot arc may be all chopped up and shuffled around, the ending may be arbitrary because real life doesn’t have neat endings, but the story must have shape, or else it isn’t a story.
Contain no elements that don’t serve the story. I don’t care how much you know about anything; if what you know doesn’t enrich your tale, save it for a cocktail party. If I’m too undereducated to get your allusions, that’s my hard luck, but don’t make me look something up for nothing. Just don’t.
Not have too many words. That doesn’t mean “write short”. That means use as many words as you need, but don’t use more. Not a vast deal more, anyway. Beautiful language in a story is like butter on a potato. I’m partial to it, but I want more potato than butter. Way more.

When I finish your fiction, I don’t mind saying, “I’m not sure I got that.” I don’t mind saying, “I guess I’ll need to chew that over and read it again to get the most out of it.” I do mind saying, “There’s hours of my life I’ll never see again.”

Marian Allen writes science fiction, fantasy, mystery, humor, horror, mainstream, and anything else she can wrestle into fixed form.

Allen has had stories in on-line and print publications, on coffee cans and the wall of an Indian restaurant in Louisville, Kentucky. On Tuesdays, she posts on the group blog Fatal Foodies. Her novel, EEL’S REVERENCE, a science fiction/fantasy, is available through Echelon Press in various electronic formats.

Allen is a member of the Green River Writers and the Southern Indiana Writers Group, and is a regular contributor to SIW’s annual anthology.