Research Sites for Writers

There are many, many useful sites on the web. The sites here are a small sampling and they are all searchable so you can find what you need when you need it.

I am always looking for more reliable, searchable sites, so if you know of any, please let me know. I am also collecting sites of use to writers generally. (See sidebar.)

General Research Sites:

• How Stuff Works
  Want to know how an autopsy works? How about a rifle? A shark? An iPhone? It's all here, including photos and videos.
  
  
• Wikipedia
  The encyclopedia written by Internet users. You will need to check and recheck information gotten from the Wiki because it's not always reliable, but many articles have reference information that can easily be verified.
  
  
• Snopes
  This is the urban legend database. If you're not sure whether your character should reference an outrageous story because it might not be true, check Snopes. If you get email claiming you could win a million dollars by forwarding it to ten people, check Snopes. (Or don't bother. It's a hoax.)
  
  
• The Straight Dope
  If you're not familiar with The Straight Dope, you're in for a treat. Cecil's columns span a variety of topics including "What Are The Nine Eskimo Words For Snow?" and "Where Are All The Baby Pigeons?" Searchable archive.
  

Topic-Specific Research Sites:

• PubMed
  Database of the National Institutes of Health and the National Library of Medicine.
  
  
• Medline
  The "consumer" branch of the PubMed database. The information here is no less correct, but geared toward laypeople.
  
  
• The Graveyard Shift
  Lee Lofland's blog, which he calls his "guide to all things cops and robbers". Lee has great pictures of all law enforcement related stuff. (Not for the faint of heart, however, since today when I checked he had bullet wound pix up.)
  
  
• WebMD
  Where most people start their medical research. A great place to have your characters look if they need something. I've had varying reports of the quality of the information on WebMD, but there's no doubt that it's the best known of the web's medical sites.
  
  
• CrazyMeds (explicit)
  CrazyMeds is not a medically sanctioned site. The information there can be brutal, tasteless and inflammatory. If, however, you're looking for side effects and complications from neuro- or psycho-active drugs, it's the best place I've ever seen to get the information. It takes some getting used to, but is a valuable resource nonetheless.
  
  
• LawGuru
  I can't vouch for this site, so you might want to take the answers given with a grain of salt, but people tell me the answers are accurate. The link takes you to the "search previous answers" area, though you can pose your own questions on other parts of the site as well.
  
  
• The Catholic Encyclopedia
  This is a fabulous resource for all things Catholic. Searchable Bible.

Among Other Things Breeding in Darkness

Since most of our Women of Mystery are in New York, I thought I'd post this information about the so-called Dead Celebrities Bill that's currently stalled (sadly, not wooden-staked) in the NY State Assembly. I first learned about it via my local Sisters In Crime.

According to the Authors Guild: This legislation would give heirs of anyone who died after January 1, 1938, the right to sue for unauthorized use in "advertising" or "for the purpose of trade" the "name, portrait, voice, signature or picture" of their deceased forebears.

In their letter to the leading and sponsoring politicians, the Guild's arguments against Bill S. 6005 include, and I excerpt freely:

1. It addresses no pressing concerns.
2. It fails to define the critical terms “advertising” and “trade.”
3. It fails to provide the minimal safeguards of California’s publicity law. [The sunset clause, 70 years after a celebrity's death would not apply under this bill.]

Our historical record cannot be under the control of the heirs of the deceased, no matter how sympathetic some of these heirs may be. The chilling effect of this legislation would be immediate and dramatic. Without radical amendment to protect the free speech concerns of historians, biographers, novelists, journalists and playwrights, and the public, it has no place in the laws of our nation’s publishing capital.

As a person who includes dead, historical figures in my work, I think this calls for vigilance. Not only would I hate for this bill to pass, I'd hate for it to serve as an example to other meddling entities. Bad legislation too often resembles an unwholesome creature of the night, like a vampire-zombies-toadstool. Sure, it appears defeated, but is merely dormant, waiting for the shadows to grow long enough to camouflage its re-emergence. And multiplication.

Image source with cool, spooky animation here.

Summertime...and the livin' is easy

It’s been many years since I anticipated a dozen free weeks at the start of a summer. But like a lot of other red-letter days from childhood, all those school year endings etched a promise in my psyche. I may now instead face a dozen crazy deadlines. But get me out along the rural lane where I live – where crickets buzz freedom in the high grass and the first blue chicory struggles through a crack in new-laid tar – and I slip into summer gear. Mellow. My brain emits alpha waves whenever a breeze rattles the leaves.

Not surprisingly, given my love for the season, events in my mystery play out over these same weeks in June. Since I started the novel, I’ve marked three summer solstices. This time around, well into the third draft, I’m so deeply into my protagonist’s head that I’m sublimely aware of what she experiences when she steps outdoors. Since my job as a writer is to convey her perspective, I’m busy capturing all the details. Her yard’s fragrant with the last of the honeysuckle because two weeks ago I inhaled a fading stand of it. Two weeks later, her own day lilies blaze orange against a deep-green spray of leaves because they’re blooming in my town wherever they’ve escaped consumption by deer. A hawk’s eerie call disturbs her sleep at night because I stood at the window at three in the morning attempting to identify the killing creature marauding out front.

Stage dressing, maybe – and I’m aware the details must be threaded between action and dialogue subtly, so that impatient readers won’t feel the weight of too much description. But these sensory details are what paint a fictional world real. Since I myself go for gobs of the stuff when it’s skillfully written, and sometimes feel constrained writing popular fiction, you’ll note that I’m taking advantage of my blog post to get some of it out of my system! Bear with me.

Exceptionally brain dead one humid day, I was inspired to rewrite my opening to convey my protagonist’s similar memories of long summer weeks stretching before her at the end of a school year. Enthused, I sat down to capture that serene and safe feeling and then to interrupt it with the first of many threats. I stopped short, remembering that my character was a competent Kiwi farm girl who’d grown up on a sheep station. In December summers she’d have rounded up lambs with the help of farm collies, then corralled them in pens by the woolshed for drafting. Any relief that kid felt, if she had any freedom at all, would come at the end of her long summer break, not the beginning.

On the particular June day when my novel opens in New York, she’d remember experiencing this valley’s sights, sounds, and smells for the first time. The sound of distant mowers would evoke her memories of a series of pleasant forays between semesters at her Manhattan art college. As for childhood memories – suffice it to say that a sense of school’s-out relief will have to be felt by some other character, in some other book, written during the long daylight hours of some other June.

–Lois

Criminal Inspirations: Mine That Cultural Divide

Another quick installment of what I hope you'll also find to be interesting and potentially fiction-inspiring crime stories.

Oldsters and whippersnappers often feel they occupy different worlds. Technologically, it may be true, though it seems to me that the operators of any machine all share some pretty stubborn human characteristics. Still, each generation re-charts its own cultural lodestars and supernovas, tending to regard those not only as sufficient, but frankly preferable to any ruling constellation of the moldy Before or inferior After. It's perfectly understandable (and wickedly amusing) that some undoubtedly damp-eared rascals were unaware of the ludicrousness of stealing Herman Munster's identity. I bet they laughed about the poor sucker's name, too.

Therein Lies A Tale

Last week, I went to St. Martin, a beautiful little island in the Caribbean. As well as gorgeous scenery, lovely weather and excellent food, the place boasts signs like this one:
Now, I don't know about you, but I don't think I want to stay in a guest house/funeral home, though as a setting for a murder mystery, it can't be beat. (Although "Jeffery's Auto Supply and Fantastic Guest House, a mere three doors down the same street, comes a close second!)

As I sat on the fabulous beach looking out over the water, I thought what a great setting it would be for something really dastardly. (Especially since research would require a great many more trips to the island.) Being of an Arthurian bent--my degrees are all in really useful things like Medieval Literature--I immediately imagined a white-clad arm reaching up from the smooth sea, sword in hand. After that, things got a little hazy. No plot or characters, just that image. (To be perfectly honest, the lack of detail might have had something to do with the pina coladas.)

Either way, this is the first time I've ever been inspired by a setting. Usually, the characters come first, needling me to give them space and time. Once in a while an event pops up, or a profession, or a snippet of conversation. But never, in my experience, a view, a place or an image.

How about you? What inspires you to write?

Hoist Upon My Own Tired Cliches

Here's a smorgasbord of cliches in word and deed-

A recent competition in The Telegraph asked contestants to "compose a piece of prose crammed with as many infuriating phrases as possible." The winning examples don't contain insults about mothers chewing cigars or sitting around the house. Mostly, they riff on the homogenized, sporty corporate lingo that saturates speech and e-mails with extra syllables while leaching them of meaning.

An eminently modern couple in New Zealand is fighting for a phrase seen most often in rap lyrics or text messages in order to name their son 4Real Wheaton. According to them, this name reflects their deepest feelings about the awestruck wonder of parenthood. Apparently, the spelled-out, concatenated phrase Forreal as a first name is vastly inferior. I would be surprised if any major database or official record system is designed to store digits anywhere in the first or last name fields. But how weak-spined it would be to let disruptions with identification for niggly things like school, medical records, credit or benefits stop one from reaching new heights of nomenclature by imposing today's catchphrase on one's own child. 4Life.

Last, here's a set of forty hackeneyed cliches that are claimed to exist only in the movies. Some are purely visual, but some are practically mold-covered plot devices I still find in newly published books. Are you guilty of using any?...Me? Oh, never. Probably never...Okay, not since last week, but I took the pledge and I'm 7 days clean. I'm worried how I'll fare once I actually start writing again though. I'm sure it'll be harder to keep the high road then.

P.S. I think we've got the house.

Caché: Missing That Story Dream

In the spirit of Clare2ey’s post earlier this week, as one of the masses I’m speaking my mind on the subject of story...with a plea that we all just stop messing with it.

Does a work qualify as a story when it doesn’t have a beginning, a middle, and an end? Well maybe. Is it story if nothing happens? Well, nooooooo...not unless it holds our attention some other way. Don’t get me wrong...I love Virginia Woolf...but even she offers events, few though they may be. Is it story if something happens but the reader/viewer is left uncertain as to what? What if the audience is expected to participate in the telling?

Maybe I’m just too conventional to appreciate experiments in storytelling. Or maybe the question isn’t so much is it story? but instead is it delicious? And there’s the rub, of course, since my cup of tea may well not be yours.

We can be pretty certain that a book or film will appeal to at least somebody if it has the standard elements: interesting theme, plot, structure, characters, setting, style, and tone. But even with all of those things going for it, a story will leave readers or viewers cold if it doesn’t hold their attention...or they can’t identify with the protagonist...or the concept just doesn’t strike them as hilarious or compelling or beguiling or charming. Take your pick.

All of this is an approach to – you guessed it – another film that lends itself well to a discussion of writing.

I didn’t much like Austrian Michael Haneke's "Caché,” (“Hidden”) a much-lauded psychological thriller. Here’s the blurb from Netflix: “Winner of the Cannes Best Director Award...centers on wealthy French couple Georges (Daniel Auteuil) and Anne (Juliette Binoche), who begin receiving threatening videotapes and phone calls. Eventually, Georges realizes who the perpetrator is but refuses to tell Anne, causing a rift. Flashbacks of George's childhood reveal the mystery, a story that illuminates France's damaged relations with Algeria.”

I’m convinced that the reason I didn’t like the film, despite the great concept that sold me on it in the first place, is because the filming of Caché wasn’t storytelling. It makes hints at a story, but demands of viewers an engagement in the process and finally the burden of deciding what really happened. Second, it never settles on a point of view. Instead, the director achieves the visual equivalent of a journalistic point of view, but in doing so only ramps up the artful confusion.

Everything in the film is intentionally ambiguous. The videotapes seem threatening, but not really. The Algerian from Georges’ past has a grudge, but when we’re introduced to him, he seems quite harmless. If he’s harmless, then the perpetrator must be his son. Only the son, too, seems benign, so now our hero’s beginning to take on a bad odor. Only we sort of sympathize. After all, his sin was that of a small child. So far so good; we’ve got complex characters. But we never get a solid feel for anyone’s motivation. And without motivation, although we see things happening, they never make much sense. There are layers and layers of subplots merely hinted at. The wife’s relationship with a friend (are they or aren’t they?). The young son’s growing anger (is he just going through puberty? or is he being influenced by the Algerians?) And what the hell happened at the end anyway? I recommend a very large screen, because the director planned for some viewers to see one thing in the final scene, some another.

Sounds interesting, right? The film has all the story elements. Fascinating theme (all that’s hidden will be revealed so everyone’s accountable in the end). A plot with all sorts of great conflict. Style and structure are intriguing (long-shots before each scene, the still camera). Intriguing characters. Great setting (an affluent Paris neighborhood in sharp contrast to its seedy outskirts). Deliberate and effective dark tone.

So am I too uptight? Not enough of an intellectual? The director’s considered a genius, so who am I to argue? I’m missing two ingredients, and this analysis reaffirms their importance. To me, at least.

First, a sense of confidence in the storyteller...the one who’s supposed to lead us by the hand through a story, for heaven’s sake. I don’t like constantly being jerked awake from my story dream when time after time I hit a brick wall, forced to make yet another decision because, by golly, Haneke hasn’t made it. What he’s decided to do is play a psychological game with both hero and viewer.

Second, that slippery element called point of view. In this film we never know with whom we should identify. This is intentional – yet another aspect of the film’s ambiguity – but it sure doesn't work for me. The whole purpose of point of view is to give us a character’s perspective, to allow us to experience events through her eyes or ears. If she’s got attitude, we’ve got attitude. If she 'sees' the world through auditory signals, that’s how we perceive too. Gradually we come to accept her motivation because we’re right there in her head. Multiple pov can work as long as we're quite sure whose head we’re in at any given moment. If the pov’s omniscient, we’ve got the narrator’s solid perspective. And that’s where the film failed me. The persistent journalistic point of view gave us no way to interpret events. A journalistic pov can work well at the start of a novel or film, where it provides an eerily broad view. But we must eventually be allowed to get inside someone’s viewpoint.

Not in Caché. So is it story? It sure isn't storytelling.

–Lois

What If I'm Only In Like With You?

I've been too long absent from posting, partly the result of a months-long and ongoing (sigh) house hunt. Today, while sitting in my shoebox waiting for The Call to tell me whether our offer's been accepted (and browsing yet more new listings in case it hasn't), I happened across this article. Julia Keller, the Chicago Tribune's cultural critic, says the future of books is in growing the number of likers, not necessarily focusing one's efforts on the die-hard book lovers.

I do love books. That said, I deeply enjoy and revere a lot of other forms, too, and support them all in alternating and sporadic ways. This may make me more of a "liker" as she defines it. Furthermore, I do prefer when authors make it easy to join a series part way, for example, or sellers introduce me in friendly ways to things I might have missed. I like not to feel in reading a review that, without poring over all the antecedents or heavy-hitters on the scene, a reader's perceived as being unable to assess the quality of a single title or even to understand the criticism. To me, it's not about being low-brow or even middle-brow. It's about sharing one's enthusiasm for wonderful things in a way that welcomes newcomers rather than implicitly condemning them for not being "in on it" already. If Teh Interweebs are about anything, they seem to be about inclusion and inviting new guests to lots of different kinds of parties. I'm giving Julia my Amen chorus, but what do you think?

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Quite contrarily, I find.

Yesterday I went to the firing range to take the same class Terrie and Clare took a few weeks back. While there, I had a discussion with two of my classmates over lunch about how we write. I've always believed that one reason I write everything by hand is that I am not, strictly speaking, a child of the computer era. My first computer was a 512kE Mac, bought when I was in grad school. So I had already had years of manuscripts behind me before I tried computers.

But these women were older than I am and one of them writes everything on the computer. She says her hands move faster on the computer than they do on the page, so the computer allows her to keep up with her thoughts. But after six years of working chat rooms for AOL, my fingers move pretty darned fast on the keyboard, so that's not what prevents me from using the computer to draft or to edit. (When I edit, I print everything out and then edit by hand. I'm on a first name basis with the woman at the copy and print center at my local Staples.)

Nor is it my love of fountain pens that compels me to write by hand.

No, there is something about the flow of ink across the page that allows me to think creatively.

When I was writing analytical, theoretical work for academia, I wrote and edited everything on the computer. That work was quite creative, too, but I suspect it came from a different area of the brain, an area not triggered by ink and paper.

I wish the reverse was true. That is, I write a heck of a lot more words of fiction (and I have a heck of a lot more editing of those words to do) than I ever did of analysis. It would be far easier and more efficient if I could do that work on the keyboard. But no, as everything in life, my nature is contrary.

Who Buys Books?

David Montgomery writes about authors and books for several of the country's largest newspapers, including the Chicago Sun-Times, Philadelphia Inquirer, Boston Globe and South Florida Sun-Sentinel. He also writes short stories and I have heard he is working on a mystery novel.

His crime fiction blog is always filled all sorts of information sure to interest mystery readers and mystery writers.

David's June 10th post gives us a terrific profile of who is most likely to buy the books that we are writing. Take a look here.

Okay, if you don't want to link to David's blog, (and you're missing a real treat if you don't stop by CrimeFictionBlog.com once in a while) I'll give you a hint: women are the biggest book market.


Now link to David to find out more.

Terrie

What Characters Teach Us

I know, I know. As writers we’re compulsive and hard on ourselves. We sacrifice a lot for the dubious pleasure of inventing worlds and a bunch of characters to set loose in them. Some of us are crazed and anti-social. We’d be better off kibitzing with the neighbors than we are pursuing killers on the page.

But I’m here to tell you that in many ways, writing a novel has benefited my mental health. I’m not talking about the fact that writing can be cathartic. I’m talking about what I’ve learned from my characters.

My protagonist is much better than I am at drawing boundaries, for example. She’s clear about what she’ll put up with and what she won’t. When she won’t permit a guy – one who’s bad for her – to re-enter her life, it’s because she’s drawn a line in the sand. She won’t put up with his volatility because it’s proved destructive for her and for the kid she takes care of. As a result, she’s not at all timid about telling him off. Instead, she’s prepared to lose his affection, ready to slam down barriers at the first sign of anger. (Man. When I think about the stuff I put up with over the years....)

Okay, so I'm starting to see things her way. How cool is that? I no longer need therapy. Instead I just need to get inside the head of somebody smarter than I am about the behavior that's acceptable between two people.

Another thing. She’s efficient. She knows just what to focus on and what to leave up to the cops on the case. Nothing in my own life seems quite so clear. My head’s full of grays. More often than not I can't see through the mist when I'm faced with decisions. She’d never end up so stymied. Frankly, she can't afford to be foggy...there aren't enough pages! In fact, she’s had to scrap a few sub-plots in order to make time for a little sex! I really ought to take a lesson.

And, God help me, where she’s methodical, I’m of the hell-is-an-outline mindset. Yet I saw the value of the spreadsheet she created to compare motivations and opportunity. Such an approach, I realized, would help me to compare my characters’ goals at the start of each scene. Just kidding. Well almost. She did create such a spreadsheet. But the two of us had the good sense to drop the scene.

That’s another thing I’ve learned from writing a novel. That folks start out with an agenda when they begin a conversation, whether conscious or no. To nail those goals, I've had to play analyst. And you know what? In understanding her motivations, I discovered a few clues as to my own.

Of course, on the whole, she’s not really smarter. What is she thinking, turning over all those rocks looking for vermin? Will she never learn that she’s bound to expose one or two that bite?

-Lois

Home, Home on the Range

Not a western range, not a kitchen range, but a gun range. Last Saturday, Clare and I went to a range to learn how to shoot a gun. Well, I went to learn, Clare turned out to be quite a markswoman, based on her experience trap shooting when she lived in Texas. Our foursome included Randy Kandel, the new president of the NY/Tri-State Chapter of Sisters in Crime, whose short story, “Name Tagging” will be released in Fall 2007 as part of the anthology, Murder New York Style, and another Sister in Crime, Tama Ryder, who is presently shopping her new thriller, The Loft. I don’t know how to do the “click here” links that my able colleagues whip out so easily, so I’ll just give you Tama’s website and you can read all about her and The Loft. www.tamaryder.com

So there we all were in Ridgewood, New Jersey with a very patient instructor named Mike Maione, who spent hours teaching us the intricacies of the mechanics and safety that every person should know before they pick up a gun. Shooting is definitely not as easy as the gang-bangers pretend.

After lunch, we each loaded, shot and reloaded and shot, etc. a .22 semi-automatic. Up close and personal, guns are loud, and when you pull the trigger, the gun has a definite kick. The shooter has to be in tight control.

Mike answered a lot of questions that probably don’t come up in his usual training sessions, but he’s taught other Sisters in Crime, so he’s used to weird questions.

Thanks, Mike, for helping us to more realistic writers. Someday one of us may have a character named Dirty Harriet filling her magazine and blasting away the bad guys. And she'll do it all safely!

Terrie

Something Old, Something New

Still exhausted from Book Expo America, I left on Tuesday for the big conference/expo for my "day job," the Bead and Button Show. Bead and Button is held every year in Milwaukee, which is a bit of a hike, but they have great classes and the all the expo hall is full of new, cool inventions.

I come back from these shows with so many new things my fingers are itching to try. And I should try them. Because I have a big show coming up next month and not enough product. Plus, new things always excite people, so if I try out some of the new presses and glasses I bought, I have a better chance of making money.

But I also want to work on my writing. And I should. Because I have to (well, want to) send out a partial, and I can't do that unless I revise, revise, revise. And after Catherine's inspiring post, I am determined to get to it!

Plus, I have an idea for a new book in a different genre and the characters are beating against the inside of my head.

Multi-tasking is one thing, but this is ridiculous.

Enough is Enough

The pundits say make your manuscript the best it can be before you start sending it out. I wouldn’t think of doing anything else. But my dilemma is, how do you know when it’s the best it can be?

At Sleuthfest in April, I had a pitch session with an agent I greatly admire and I was thrilled when she asked to see the full manuscript. In the months before the conference, I had completed two major edits/rewrites on the book, one to include some changes that I thought were necessary and the second, in response to the critique of a writer friend, to tighten and clarify. So I left the pitch session confident that the manuscript was ready to go in the mail as soon as I got home.

But on the plane flying back from Florida the nasty little voice in my head convinced me that I couldn’t send the book out without checking one more time for spelling errors and stray commas. It has to be the best you can make it, the voice said, you’d better ask Sherry, an excellent copyeditor, to read the book again and do another edit at the same time as you.

Sherry did her part quickly and she found surprisingly few problems. I, on the other hand, could not limit myself to copyediting. In fact, I found myself in the midst of another extensive rewrite that included slashing, tightening, rearranging, searching again for the perfect word, and … well, you get the picture. Three weeks later, it was ready to go. But then I asked Sherry how she liked what I had to done to the book since she last read it, several versions ago. “It’s great, much stronger, the writing gets better and better, I like it a lot,” she said. But, I pressed, tell me, did it drag or not hold your attention anywhere? “A little slow before we get to the murder,” she said, “but you can't change those scenes, they’re so well-written and, in and of themselves, interesting and exciting.” I knew what she meant. I loved those scenes too.

But how could I expect an agent to read the entire manuscript if a friendly reader thought it dragged a bit in the beginning? Was it really the best I could make it? I went off to think and gnash my teeth. It wasn’t the first time I had considered these scenes. In fact, each time I did a draft (many, many) I struggled with this section, trying to figure out how to speed it up, but I couldn’t see a way. Then, suddenly, as often happens with writing, it was clear that those wonderful scenes, my darlings, didn’t move the story forward and they needed to go. Not only that, I knew exactly what to keep from those scenes and where to put it. So I got rid of my darlings and rewrote other scenes to include the important points. At the end, I had deleted 5,000 words from my 100,000 word book. I think it is a better book now. Is it the best I can make it? Right now it is. At least I hope so, because I sent it to the agent last week.

Catherine

Who's Calling the Shots?

I’ve always been intrigued when authors talk about a character who ‘takes over’ as if the author is just along for a ride. I’m as eager as any writer to meet a strong character...one whose voice I can simply sit down and record on paper as she speaks. Perhaps I’m too new at this game to have met one.

Stranger Than Fiction (Will Ferrell, Emma Thompson, Dustin Hoffman...what are you waiting for!) portrays such an author-character relationship. Critics seemed baffled as to how to bill this film (comedy? drama? romance? fantasy?) which, although nominated for a Golden Globe, received mixed reviews. Frankly, I don’t see how anyone but a writer could appreciate all of its nuances. But it’s a must see for novelists. (And graphic artists, who seem as excited by it as I am.) The DVD’s worth owning just for Emma Thompson’s role.

It was mind-blowing to see the author-character relationship enacted on screen. We’ve got the character. He’s begun to hear his life narrated while he lives it. We’ve got the novelist, who is brewing and testing out possible endings for his story. Finally, we’ve got the renowned professor of literature in an earnest attempt, for the sake of the character who appeals for his help, to arrive at the author’s identity and the character’s fate by methodical means. First he determines the book’s point of view, from a recitation of a single omniscient sentence. Next, its genre, from the character’s recent experiences. Finally, his destiny, from a description of the author’s tone and voice.

“Wow,” you say. And rightly so.

This would make a great party game. (Be sure to invite a few avid readers – you’ll need to pair them up with less literate friends.) Rip two chapters from the middle of a bunch of novels and describe the narration and a couple of salient events to a partner whose job it is to guess both author and ending. You only get to read aloud one sentence.

But I digress. In Stranger than Fiction, although our character puts up a struggle in his own cause, he is ultimately subject to the mercies of his inventor. It’s meeting him that undoes her. She is clearly gratified to see him fully – and unerringly – realized. “Your hair! Your eyes! Your shoes!”

Sadly, my own characters seem quite shy. So far I’ve had to coax them out of hiding, and while over time they do reveal themselves in enchanting ways, they certainly haven’t led me by the nose. Despite having let them know I’m a team player, they seem inclined to defer to me. Judging by the corners I’ve painted us into, we might do a whole lot better were they stronger-willed.

–Lois

Positive Rejection

I just got a great rejection, and I'm reporting it here in detail.

The rejection came via an assistant to an agent, in response to the 100 pages of my mystery, as they had requested. It gives lots of stuff to mull over, and it shows a great relationship between assistant and agent.

Here's the key elements of the rejection:

---

Hi Na n ,

Thanks for sending this – what a fun premise! ...We think you have a perfect setting for a juicy mystery here, along with the right elements for a more serious subplot.

[However] we [assistant and agent] weren’t quite there with your characters going through each moment with them. While we love the idea of [the protag's] business and her style and her moxy, we didn’t feel that these things all came through loud enough on the page – we needed more descriptive detail about [the characters]. You’ve set up a fantastic plot...but we came away from these pages wanting to connect more with your characters, and to really be rooting for them throughout the book. When we didn’t feel this way, I’m afraid we lost some of the excitement that we initially had for your story.

Keeping all of this in mind, we don’t feel that we would be the best person to represent your work at this time. I’m sorry we won’t have the chance to work together... We wish you much luck and success in finding the right home for your work, and do feel free to keep in touch in the future with other projects.

All the best,

---
My reaction was rather joyeous, having been through this querying process a few times. I sent them a thank-you with a secondary query:

---

Many thanks for your extended comments. You gave me great insight into the missing/weak elements in my manuscript. I had suspicions that I'd missed the mark, but wondered if I was close enough to be invited for a resubmission. I will be rewriting based upon your advice.
Would you be willing to look at a major revamping (pardon the expression) based upon your suggestions in 2 to 3 months (or more, if you prefer)?

I remain convinced that you are a great match for [my story] and that my ability to rewrite will provide you with something you might want to consider.

However this proposal might fare, you have my sincere gratitude for your enlightening comments.

---
Then, minutes later, came the following response:

Thanks very much for your email. Please feel free to send us a revision whenever you have it ready, and we would be happy to read.

---

The moral of the story: when you get a rejection from someone enthusiastic about your submission, appreciate that for all it's worth and take a risk in your reply. AND, some assistants are gems! Treat them with respect. In a couple years they might be a full-fledged agent looking to represent your manuscript!

This, too, proves to me that reading books with characters similar to yours will aim your agent queries in the right direction. Track down the agents who like your kind of characters, and you'll be saving a lot of pointless queries.

Now it's back to the drawing board. I plan a major reworking of my story, and I'm glad to have the grace of time to do just that. Once I get the hang of writing a mystery that works well, I sure do hope the subsequent revisions/new manuscripts will have fewer problems.

Any observations or interpretations of the exhanged notes or the route I should head for in my revisions would be greatly appreciated!

Write ON!

Nan

Plarty Time!

Have you heard of plot parties - a.k.a. plarties?

I first heard of them as an actual sit-down, pull up some chocolate and brainstorm plot problems out of existence party. Everybody gets a turn to present their basic plots, summing up the parts where they feel a need for more development. Then it's brainstorming time.

My mystery writing buddies are scattered around the country. Hmmm. We swap thoughts across the internet in various Yahoo groups. Double hmmm. Was an internet plarty possible? We decided to give an try. If you're interested, here's how we managed the chaos:

We polled our buddies for potential members. Once we got a group of 5+ members we set up a Yahoo Group - easy to do. More info to follow on that. Once the group formed, all members were invited to post their problems.

That's when we got a slew of postings jumbled one atop the other. A bit of chaos. Everyone did the introduction thing, then asked who would be first up. We kept it polite: First come, first served on the request to be first up. We all had a week to respond with ideas/suggestions/questions before the next posting. In pretty short order we had covered a lot of ground, had a ton of fun, and gained a lot of ideas that we could snatch, modify to fit our needs, and apply to our own works in progress, even though they were intended for another writer's plot.

Lots of questions were raised. Everyone had a different take on the twists and turns that might fit into the plot. For those of us working on a mystery series the group contributions opened ideas for the next "book(s)" to come.

Revisions came in due time. Reposting latest version of the plot situation, sometimes with new questions. A mystery plot is like a house of cards: move one element and you put all others in jeopardy. It's all in the details.

Throughout all this, nobody provided actual text to be critiqued. The group is not meant to be a critique experience, just an on-going brainstorming party. Most of us have other critique buddies or groups for that. The energy produced by the group plotting is remarkable. You can feel your synapses snapping!

If you're in need of pointers on setting up a Yahoo group, let me know via comment. I assume any internet group would be easy enough to establish, but I'm conversant solely in Yahoo group set ups.

If you've experimented with similar parties or groups, I'd love to hear from you.

Write On!
Nan

Description: How Much Is Too Much?

Recently, my critique group read a chapter of my work in progress. One person commented that he thought I should describe my protagonist more fully. Two others disagreed. In the end, the split was even: two said I had insufficient description, two said the description was fine the way it was.

So what's an author to do?

When I am reading, I don't like huge amounts of description of the characters because I want to be able to imagine them myself. Since that's my feeling, I don't tend to include a great deal of character description in my own work. These are pretty much the only descriptions of my protagonists at the moment.

Back in the kitchen, I opened [the photo album] to a page about halfway through.
“That was Thad Laughton when I first met him, in what my brother, Kev, calls his ‘bronze god’ phase.” Thad and I were standing on a beach in Martha’s Vineyard. Thad, his blonde hair streaked from the sun, his buff body toned and tanned, held me around the waist with one arm, his free hand raised in a victory sign. I was tan, too, and a good twenty pounds lighter than my current 150.
...
Not only had I put on weight since leaving my old, stress-filled life, but my dark hair was long and untreated, cut into a deliberately ragged shag that allowed me to go months between salon appointments, and I’d traded in my suits and slacks for jeans and sweatshirts or floaty skirts and funky boots.

I know it's not much, but I don't want to put too much emphasis on what she looks like. Somewhere I mention her height at 5'4", but that's it.

On the other hand, I do tend to describe the environment in depth. Restaurants, hotels, hikes, drives, whatever is going on, I want to read about what it looks, feels, smells, tastes like, so that's what I write, too.

At a conference I was at recently, a panelist (and I honestly can't remember who it was) said that the American attention span is too short to handle long passages of description these days. People want action, plot, not scene-setting or or information without direct connection to the plot. (We're talking about genre fiction here, not "literary fiction." Specifically mysteries. I suspect people reading fantasy still want a fair amount of world-building descriptive details.)

But readers are not all alike. As I mentioned to the panelist, I love John Connolly. I think it was in Black Angel, though I could be wrong, he went into a long exposition about the history of the New Orleans police force. Did that history impact the plot? Nope. Did I read every word? Yup. And thoroughly enjoyed them, too. Connolly wouldn't be Connolly without such digressions.

But perhaps he would. Because a friend of mine enjoys Connolly's books, too, but she reads them for the characters and the action. She skims or skips the descriptive passages. I could argue that she's wrong, that one should read every word an author writes, but the truth is I skip a lot of description in other people's books, too. If the descriptive passages don't provide atmosphere, affect my mood, I don't particularly care about them. (Another author who's particularly good at using descriptive passages to set a mood, I think, is M.J. Rose.)

I haven't yet figured out how to approach my descriptions to create the kind of emotional impact I'm trying to get across here, but I am aiming for it.

So what about you? More description? Less? Digressions? No?