World, Writing, Wealth discussion

Anyone game?

I bought it and got to page 1 yesterday. It talks states that there are only 4 things you need to know and one of them is "scene and sequel", which is also what Jim Butcher recommends in his

I'm in. Two chapter review every Friday?

Tara wrote: "I'm in. Two chapter review every Friday?"

you're hardcore.

starting tomorrow? i can read 35pp tonight.

Yeah! See you on Friday ;)

Okay, um, wait. I spoke WAY too soon! There is no Audible version of the book, so...might be a problem for me...I'll get back to you...

Tara wrote: "Okay, um, wait. I spoke WAY too soon! There is no Audible version of the book, so...might be a problem for me...I'll get back to you..."

i'm waiting w/bated breath.

Um, yeah...that whole vision thing lol. If the book is on ibooks we're good. Be right back...

Abuddy read is a two (or more) person book discussion. Or, in my case, a book discussion wherein one doesn't look before one leaps.

Count me in on this. I read the first chapter. Good stuff! One example: I've seen other advice saying do this or that exercise. I've never done that. Swain says no: "The man who cottons to exercises generally is not cut out to be a fiction writer. He's certainty-oriented; reaching out for a sure thing."

I'll be moving on to Chapter 2. This is fun.

I'll alternate this read with my SF Asimov. Swain mentions feelings in a big way. Asimov is very much describing the feelings of the detective. So the Asimov is almost a companion read. You could say the same thing for the Tom Clancy Jack Ryan I just finished - tons of feelings, emotions from Jack Ryan.

I bought it too, by the way, good old Amazon Prime! :-)

Excellent! Which Asimov?

The Naked Sun book 2 in the Elijah Bayley detective series. Lots of internal conflict from Bayley - and it comes through really well because Asimov, like the SF writers of his time, did not write massive books - they are streamlined.

Good book! Some info is a little dated, but overall I find it sound.

There is humor, too, or at least I thought it was funny.
Swain: "My guess is that occasionally we all tend to get tangled up in the maze of our own thinking."
So, from direct experience, if you've ever written something and thought, hey, wait, why don't I just break that up, it's probably for a good reason.

On to Chapter 3!

Thx, M.L.!

I'll read it tonight & post my thoughts.

M.L. wrote: "Count me in on this. I read the first chapter. Good stuff! One example: I've seen other advice saying do this or that exercise. I've never done that. Swain says no: "The man who cottons to exercise..."

so, what? no writing prompts? last summer, my daughter took a creative writing class and all they did was writing prompts and she hated it--she wanted to get on with her own story, which she'd already started. in spite of the fact that i had never really done writing prompts either, i told her that writing prompts are good practice, but she wasn't convinced.

i guess she was right and i should've heeded my own personal practices--or lack thereof.

M.L. wrote: "Swain mentions feelings in a big way. Asimov is very much describing the feelings of the detective."

Yes! He cautions against writing too objectively instead about feelings. This idea is pretty much in line w/Poetics:

"The poet's job is to use representation to make us enjoy the tragic emotions of pity and fear, and this has to be built into his plots."

M.L. wrote: "Good book! Some info is a little dated, but overall I find it sound.

There is humor, too, or at least I thought it was funny.
Swain: "My guess is that occasionally we all tend to get tangled up i..."

yes, the book is written for the traditional market.

i really like how he breaks it down into bite-sized steps.

motivation-reaction units -> scenes-sequel -> story patterns + interesting characters

yes, in addition to the advice on breaking up convoluted sentences, chapter 2 is chock-full of other good sentence-level advice, including the avoidance of adverbs and the emphasis on active verbs (as opposed to static verbs like "to be"). the main thrust is to write vividly, clearly, and place the writing within the scene appropriately: who, what, why, where, when, how (the standard questions that journalists must answer in an article).

I think prompts can be useful if someone doesn't have a story immediately in mind. I'm on the other side of that--too many ideas. Stephen King in his book on writing actually gave writing 'assignments.' I think that's where I stopped reading it. It was a good memoir though about his writing.
The practice of using prompts however, unless briefly, goes against the other rule - write what you love - and your daughter was doing just that!

M.L. wrote: "The practice of using prompts however, unless briefly, goes against the other rule - write what you love - and your daughter was doing just that!"

lol. how true!

i'm reading it today. on p.44, this emphasis really hit home to me. i've heard it many times before, but perhaps it's just the timing--and Ann keeps talking about "feels"--but i really believe it now:

"Without feeling, he [the reader] won't care what happens in your story.
If he doesn't care, he stops reading.
And you're dead."

EDIT: to be clear, this feeling is mainly directed at the MC.

I'm just over half way - took time out to read another book (2 books, one done and one in progress) - but will be going back to this one soon. Lots of good info. It will probably come down to 1 or 2 actionable take-aways.

you're a fast and dedicated reader! i'm only on p.66. i'll post some thoughts tonight.

it might be interesting to compare it to jim butcher's writing advice on livejournal, which takes the same scene-sequel tack:

http://jimbutcher.livejournal.com/

I'm in a mostly reading mode at present! Thanks for the link, I added it to favorites and will be reading it too.

I skimmed over Butcher's posts really fast and there are a lot of similarities. Since I did skim I might have missed it, but one difference is that Swain talks about the writing itself and I didn't see that in Butcher's comments. Let me know though if I just missed it. Thanks again for posting it!

M.L. wrote: "I skimmed over Butcher's posts really fast and there are a lot of similarities. Since I did skim I might have missed it, but one difference is that Swain talks about the writing itself and I didn't..."

sorry that i haven't gotten back to the "selling writer". was caught up doing the spreadsheet. i'll get back to it this week, since i'm on vacation.

Alex G wrote: "M.L. wrote: "I skimmed over Butcher's posts really fast and there are a lot of similarities. Since I did skim I might have missed it, but one difference is that Swain talks about the writing itself..."

Oh, no worries! :-) I took time away to read 2 books! I'm starting a third so will read this in segments in between.

M.L. wrote: "I took time away to read 2 books! I'm starting a third so will read this in segments in between. "

since you're going strong, do you want to add a 4th?

Successful Self-Publishing: How to self-publish and market your book in ebook and print

only 81pp. i'm at 20% now and it seems like a quick start guide.

if it meets those expectations,then I'll start on

How To Market A Book

in this book, Penn references authorearnings.com, so i think that she has very solid research backing her up.

and after that, maybe:

Alex G wrote: "M.L. wrote: "I took time away to read 2 books! I'm starting a third so will read this in segments in between. "

since you're going strong, do you want to add a 4th?[book:Successful Self-Publishing..."

Sure, I'll add that to the queue! I just started another Tom Clancy so it may be a week or more, but I'm interested in reading Penn's advice.

M.L. wrote: "Sure, I'll add that to the queue! I just started another Tom Clancy so it may be a week or more, but I'm interested in reading Penn's advice."

done with Successful Self-Publishing: How to self-publish and market your book in ebook and print. thank you so much for finding it! it is gold in 81 pages.

bought How To Market A Book and am keen to start it. (i'll try to read "techniques" at the same time.)

Alex G wrote: "M.L. wrote: "Sure, I'll add that to the queue! I just started another Tom Clancy so it may be a week or more, but I'm interested in reading Penn's advice."

done with [book:Successful Self-Publishi..."

That's a great endorsement! I'll definitely have to read it.

M.L. wrote: "Alex G wrote: "M.L. wrote: "Sure, I'll add that to the queue! I just started another Tom Clancy so it may be a week or more, but I'm interested in reading Penn's advice."

done w/How To Market A Book. the short answer is:

buy it b/c it has a lot of details, ideas, and links to more info.

you can read my brief review, although my status updates on it are more informative.

back to "techniques" and the Butcher Live journal.

Hey guys
Just wanted to add 2 other ebooks to what has already been shared. They helped me a lot when I came up with my marketing plan.

Smashwords Book Marketing Guide
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view...

The Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view...

They're free and I found them super informative :)

Cool. We should adds them to our writing bookshelf

i'm on p.182 of Techniques of the Selling Writer in which the middle is described. seems like a rehash of scene-sequel. i'm also tired of the sexist examples.

a year or two ago i checked it out from the library and started reading it, but I DNF'd it. now i realize why it is so hard to read. although it does have 2-level outlines here and there, it's paragraph after paragraph w/o any headings, its examples are mixed in w/its imperative statements/directions, and it has a lot of conversational fluff.

M.L. wrote: "I skimmed over Butcher's posts really fast and there are a lot of similarities. Since I did skim I might have missed it, but one difference is that Swain talks about the writing itself and I didn't see that in Butcher's comments. Let me know though if I just missed it. Thanks again for posting it!"

no, Butcher doesn't talk about the mechanics so much, but then again neither does Swain--he talks about avoiding adverbs and such. And, frankly, Strunk and White do a much better job of it.

Really, there are many better books, period. This is the only book that I've ever returned.

i won't belabor my points (I've ranted about it enough in my status updates for this book and in my review.)

Alex G wrote: "M.L. wrote: "I skimmed over Butcher's posts really fast and there are a lot of similarities. Since I did skim I might have missed it, but one difference is that Swain talks about the writing itself..."

Oh, I found that Swain does talk about mechanics, that's what interests me, or one of the things. It's almost a back to basics. Strunk and White is good too.

A lot of what resonates depends on the reader. One thing going for Swain is that Pickering, who is kind of the benchmark for indies currently, gave it such a high endorsement. That represents a working model, so to speak.

I'm still at the same place I was a couple weeks back--getting caught up on writing and group reads, independent reads, but I will go back to it.

The sexist comments are eye rollers, for sure, but a couple of recent GR crime club reads have the same type thing and it's almost historical-attitudes of the times, so I disregard those.

M.L. wrote: "Oh, I found that Swain does talk about mechanics, that's what interests me, or one of the things. It's almost a back to basics. Strunk and White is good too."

are you, perhaps, referring to motivation-reaction units: 1) write a sentence w/o your character; (2) follow it w/a sentence about your character's reaction to (1). i did find this valuable.

I'd completely agree w/one of the reviews (by https://www.goodreads.com/author/show...) that stated:

What little useful information is available would be more appropriate in the form of a 100-tips blog post.

M.L. wrote: "One thing going for Swain is that Pickering, who is kind of the benchmark for indies currently, gave it such a high endorsement. That represents a working model, so to speak."

that is one reason why i picked it up again, but after reading this book, i think that, in sum total, Pickering is wrong in that there are better choices (by better, i mean more succinct, clearer, and less laden w/author's world view); and while it is true that the reading experience depends upon the reader, i'd argue that that applies far more often to fiction than in non-fiction how-to treatises.

Alexa wrote: "Hey guys
Just wanted to add 2 other ebooks to what has already been shared. They helped me a lot when I came up with my marketing plan.

Smashwords Book Marketing Guide
https://www.smashwords.com/b..."

thx! i added them to our "resources" spreadsheet.