The Mysteries of Genre Selection

Writing blogs abound. Not just author / writer / indie publishers, but people that consult on the art of writing. People that take and make money polishing and honing the written words of others. Many of them advise, and I always imagine them looking over the tops of their bifocals, to "write for your genre". This makes sense, I also think it should be half way obvious though as well. At some point in the writing life cycle I think everyone comes up with the curiosity of "who is going to read my book?". For some, including me at the moment, recognizing your target audience is important, but that is a goal not always easy to meet.

For example, one of the main MCs in River and Ranch, a book I will soon be publishing, lives in Idaho, on a ranch. So I kind of lean towards calling it a western. But most of the western genre today seems to be historical in nature, the MCs are men, and the women are large breasted and waiting around for Mr. Handsome. River and Ranch takes place in the present day. It is a woman who lives on the ranch. She pulls her weight, is a nuclear geophysicist, and somehow makes it through the book without a description of her feminine attributes. She's also independent, although I have to admit she is willing to talk to (and maybe a bit more) the other MC. Can I find a hint of modern Western? as a genre? Not so far.

The other MC is a river guide on the Salmon River, also in Idaho. Not much land-based action, and no horses, except when he meets the other MC and sparks fly. Most of this MCs action takes place on the river as a guide. It is outdoors, in the west. This still kind of wants to be a modern Western, but I hit the same problem, it is "not exactly" a western. Of course the two MCs meet and sparks fly, so this could actually be a romance, and it is, the two characters do fall in love (and much more as well hint hint). So romance does fit. And don't take the prior statement the wrong way, River and Ranch is family friendly. I've discovered there is a "sweet" label in the genre world, that is commonly understood to mean no sex and nothing graphic. River and Ranch fits that. There is adventure throughout the book as the guide is down the river in much of the book. The rancher is also up in the mountains dealing with cattle on the way to their high meadows. Stuff happens in an active adventurous way.

There are two daughters involved, and some of the story is seen through their eyes. So I could push and call River and Ranch young adult. This would fit some of it. Finally there are a couple bad guys acting separately as antagonists to both rancher and river guide. So there are elements of suspense and thrills found throughout.

In the end I am writing the book that I would like to read, as some of those advisors on occasion advise to do. I'm doing it. I also confess to being a bit burnt out on the many genre "traditions". Suspense, thriller, and adventure tends to move at a very fast pace. No time to sleep, no time to eat, no time to engage in surroundings. A fast pace, tight plot, centered on catching the bad guy, etc. They are formulaic. I love the many formulas, but I am also looking for a good read that is beyond the usual suspects when it comes to formulaic genre traditions. I want to read about food, I want to read about the surroundings. I want to read about sleeping on a beach on the Salmon River, one of the most remote spots in the USA and watching the Milky Way and shooting stars (I guess that could be construed as a spoiler, sorry). I want a strong female lead, who can shoot guns (except she corrects everyone who calls them that, they're rifles) and can saddle her own horse and grew up barrel racing. I want to have grandparents involved in the story. You never read about grandparents.

None of which makes fitting this assemblage of places and faces into a narrow orderly genre any easier. Stay tuned for the ongoing adventures of Genre Boy as he struggles to find his fit in the cold world of fiction.
Jeff Bach

Your Main Character Needs a Partner!

In genre fiction no one goes it alone. Or at least very few. This is one of the top three observations I've made as a reader over the years. As in life, everyone should have someone. This applies in romance and it applies in genre fiction as the main character runs through the pages of the book, saving the world, and surviving the harrowing circumstance that writers conjure up on the way to completion.

Let's look at a few of the authors I like in the genre fiction world. I tend to pick adventure, thriller, suspense. Clive Cussler, Robert B. Parker, Robert Crais, and Harlan Coben are at the top of my list, although many other authors also have some of my money as well. Cussler brought to life the fabulous pairs of Dirk Pitt and Al Giordino (the first pair), Kurt Austin and Joe Zavala, as well as the rare married pair of main characters Remi and Sam Fargo. Robert B. Parker brought Spencer and Hawk to the reading world and I thank him for it. I've passed many late nights with those two. Robert Crais brought about Elvis and Pike. Another pair well worth the money and the time to read and reread. Last but not least is Harlan Coben. His fertile noggin produced Myron Bolitar and Win, whose last name I cannot remember. Possibly because in the books he is always just Win, the nasty badass partner that comes in and cleans up as needed.

Not all of my favorites come in paris though, so there are exceptions. Other favorite authors include Brad Thor, Ted Bell, Ben Coes, and the sadly departed Vince Flynn. Scot Harvath, Alex Hawke, Dewey Andreas, and Mitch Rapp, the characters belonging to those authors do not generally have tight partners appearing throughout the book. If you compare Spencer and Hawk to Rapp you see an immediate difference. Likewise with Elvis and Pike compared to Scot Harvath. Same drill.

Interestingly, at least to me, there could be a third group in this discussion. James Rollins writes another bunch of really awesome books in the same categories. While I've read all of his books and greatly enjoyed them, his characters, to my mind, are in a group. Not so much an MC and a sidekick. He features a main character that is at least part Native American. He also features the rare pair of partner characters who are married. Quite the ground breaker this Rollins guy. Well worth reading! As an aside, one of his books has the most compelling interesting and fascinating look at quantum mechanics that I've ever come across. Moreover, it was in a religious/prayer context. Incredibly well done.

So of course it can work in many ways ways, but pairs of characters enter my writing thoughts first. Especially Spencer and Hawk from Robert B. Parker and Elvis and Pike from Robert Crais. Dirk Pitt and Al Giordino follow closely along with Kurt Austin and Joe Zavala, all four of those characters coming from the fertile mind of Clive Cussler.

In all cases, the bad guy always seems to be going it solo. That's probably another topic though.

So while your MC is out saving the world, consider writing in a partner watching the shadows and providing the comic relief and additional drama that only a partner can provide!

Book Covers - What Makes them Great?

Every day I ask my eighth grader what she learned in school. Usually it's a snarky "nothing Dad". But I ask myself that question too. Book covers was the learning topic today. The awesome Joanna Penn led the way with a superb article on her blog The Creative Penn. She's a frequent blogger, so the article is: Book Marketing: On Changing Book Covers. For me, this is one of the top three reads on what should go into a book cover. I bookmarked it. JA Penn hit the nail on the head. Emotion. Theme vs. Character. Meeting Genre Expectations. And more. Go read it if you are struggling with book covers.

Her article referred to an author I had never heard of, Russell Blake. He had another awesome article on making good book covers. Russell Blake Judging Books. He also posted the progression of the four book covers he had evolved through on the way to finding the one that he thought was best AND that also was supporting the strongest sales of the book. Great commentary on his thought process along the way. More great stuff if you are struggling with covers.
So for the first time ever, here's the working copy of my first fiction book, River and Ranch Does Landscape reach out and grab with an emotional connect? Does a horse in a meadow in the mountains convey an image that leads to reading and buying? It lacks people. Is this a showstopper? Does this not convey what the book is about? It is about a ranch and horses and riding in the meadows. But it is about people too. So for now it's a working cover until I can figure out something better.

Fascinating - to me anyway -interview with Elizabeth Gilbert

I guess I'm one of the three people in the US that hasn't read or seen Eat Pray Love. But a few months back, I was driving along listening to WI Public Radio and this show was on and I started listening and it was riveting. As in really really interesting. Turns out that it was an interview with Elizabeth Gilbert, the author of Eat Pray Love, who now has a new book, The Signature of All Things. I did something for a first time while I listened to that show. I got my phone out and used the voice recorder for the first time to remind myself of this author and this interview. Last night in a dark freezing Janesville parking lot at midnight, I was waiting for my wife to arrive on a Van Galder bus, which by the way is the ONLY way to go to O'Hare from Madison. If you're into stress free driving thru congestion that is. The bus is late. Construction issues. Way late and I am bored stiff. So I get out my phone and happen to open that voice recorder app and shazam! there's that note about E.G.'s awesome 45 North interview with Anne Strainchamps. So I sat there in the dark of a cold midnight Jville bus lot and happily listened to the podcast of the interview. First one I have ever downloaded. Here it is - Elizabeth Gilbert talk go have a listen. Good stuff! I'm a new fan of the author. Her perspective on things like women in literature, and story types makes for a great listen!

Konrath Howey Shatzkin oh my!

We live in interesting times. JA Konrath, Hugh Howey, and Mike Shatzkin are making it even more interesting. Konrath and Howey are successful indie authors and maybe the largest, most active evangelists for the ecosystem of indie publishing.  Self made successes.  Mike Shatzkin, from what I have found so far, seems to be the lone voice crying out in the wilderness in defense of traditional publishing.

For the most part, Konrath and Howey are looking forward and offering their perspective, experience and expertise on a growing, moving forward industry. The Wild West.

Mike Shatzkin, at 66 yo, offers value in his perspective on the traditional publishing world. But this is almost solely done in defense and justification of an aging, collapsing, rigid, and shrinking industry, that is still the 800 pound gorilla. This is more like an austere Madison Avenue.

Once again we see the same old same old. Big established industry pays no attention to the little yappy dog barking at its heels. It plows on the same as it always has, while the little yappy dog, actually a puppy, keeps finding food and water and keeps on growing.  The little puppy that used to be heel height is now snapping at their kneecaps and still it is ignored. Music has gone through this destructive evolution. It's basically not there anymore. Can traditional publishing not see the similarities in play here? Software is mostly through this and numerous other industries can be described by this same conceptual model.

Big, comfortable, no threat perceived, no need to evolve, sit back and let the good times roll.  Given the number of established industries that have gone through this disruptive evolution, you would think traditional publishing would at least acknowledge that what has happened to others could happen to them. Not so far.  Everyone must still be in the sauna on Madison Ave, waiting for their cigars to be clipped and their dry cleaning to be delivered.

Go read what the above three pundits have written.  Well worth your time, if you are interested in this fast evolving world of writing and authoring and publishing.

The First week of authoring

So I'm closing in on the first week of being an author.  So far I've managed a few successes:

• I uploaded the mobi file to Amazon, seen the listed book complete with thumbnail and info in the Kindle store;
• I also managed an Authorcentral page, complete with links to my twitter acct, blog and some author pics;
• I followed that with going through Draft2Digital to get my paddle making book listed on Apple's ecosystem. Specifically, it is now in  the ibookstore, thumbnail, a good sample and the correct list price. Thank you goes to Tara for such fast response to my questions!
• I am still in process with Xinxii for overseas distribution. Matthias and Patricia are both responding across six or seven time zones as I wade through the best way to do an ISBN for an overseas edition of an ebook.
• Kobo also has some intriguing overseas retail partners.  
• Finally today I went ahead and sent my file up to the Barnes & Noble world as well. That was still in process last time I checked.
• Lastly is an entry in the Goodreads system. Even though I see Goodreads as mainly fiction and my ebook is a tiny slice of business non-fiction, I figured Goodreads is worth a shot.
• So far so good!

reading on mobile devices

Over the past few months I have really enjoyed the breadth and depth of content on Joel Friedlander's site, www.theBookDesigner.com. Recently I was lucky enough to write a guest article that he posted on his site. The topic was evaluating an epub file on mobile devices.  Here's the article. I also hope you'll spend a few minutes browsing through his stack. It's pretty tall. I think I read that there's something like 1200+ (it might be 12,000+) articles on the site.  I'll bet you could get a Master's degree from the content alone that you'll find on his site.

Each month he does a cover image review, in which he posts the ebook cover images that readers have submitted of their book covers. He then evaluates each image and offers his viewpoint on the strengths and weaknesses of each cover. A huge learning tool if you are into book covers, or business communication imagery in general.

I hope you'll click the links above and spend some time on theBookDesigner site. It's a great space for book-centric content!

Declare or Persuade?

In a bit of foreshadowing for an upcoming business non-fiction piece I'm writing, today's bit is based on a bit of pain I've felt over and over and over.

That pain comes from reading comments. Comments that make declarations. Comments telling me, the reader, that the writer is absolutely correct with their...(wait for it) declaration.

I wonder if the declarer has ever considered the impact of their declaration on the reader? If I go back to my days of trying to educate artists on the value of business (a futile endeavor for the most part), I remember the utility of the humble word pair.  For me the word pair that springs to mind here is:

DECLARE vs. PERSUADE; or declaration vs. persuasion; or declaring vs. persuading.

For me, reading a comment that is written declaratively, invites an immediate challenge, a disagreement with what the writer has declared, maybe even anger. I ask myself, "who made the writer the supreme knowledge holder on topic x?" Instead of agreeing with the writer's comment, my first thought is disagreement, followed by inquiry about the writer's credibility as I now go about proving the declarer to be wrong.  It's a guess, but I think the writer did not really want to inspire this in the reader.  I think most every writer wants the reader to agree with the written phrase, not fight it and go about trying to disprove it.

"No one is the supreme holder of knowledge on any one topic".  This is a declaration. I'm writing as if this is an absolute fact. For me, this tends to elicit a challenge in lieu of an agreement. I might point out that this fact is one that I can not prove. I can assert. I can declare, but I cannot call this a fact like 1+1=2 is a fact. Yet I have written as if it is a fact.  I'm inviting a negative response, when what I am looking for is agreement.  I think the writer needs to be persuasive here, not so much declarative. My intent is persuasion, but I am declaring something and in effect telling the reader to believe what I write. No show, no persuasion. Just "read what I write and accept it as fact."  Most people with critical thinking skills are going to go to the opposite end and immediately begin questioning the assertion. The opposite of what the writer intended.

"In my experience, I've never met anyone who was the supreme holder of knowledge on any one topic." To me, this says the same thing, but hopefully in a less confrontational tone.  Hopefully this is in a more persuasive tone, one that invites further interest in discussion, leading to agreement.

When does a declarative style work?  The easy answer is when one is writing about facts.  Instruction manuals come to mind right away. "Mix two parts resin to one part hardener." This is a declaration. It is an instruction. I daresay this might be an absolute fact, because if I stray from the declaration, the epoxy will not harden as I want it to. So there really is only one absolute way to do this.

So there is room for the declarative style of writing.  However, next time you are in a LinkedIn group and feel inspired to write a comment, you might consider this humble word pair of "declare vs. persuade" as you go about crafting the comment that establishes your authority on the topic.

Writing it one way invites a fight, writing it another way invites further cordial discussion, a relationship, maybe even a sale or something beneficial further on down the line.