Time to Write

Here's how to twist a familiar story formula

Today I went to see the film, “I Love You, Man,” which cleverly takes the structure of a romantic comedy and applies it to a friendship.

 The setup is that the protagonist (Paul Rudd) is about to get married and realizes that he has no close male friends to call upon to be his best man and groomsmen. He goes on a quest to find a best friend and discovers that, as with romances, the path to a true friendship can be rocky. It’s boy meets boy, boy loses boy, boy gets boy (as well as getting the girl, of course).

 The film is charming, relatively low-key, and amusing rather than laugh-out-loud funny most of the time. As well as being enjoyable for its own sake, if you’re a writer you may also find it instructive to see how it takes a predictable formula and gives it a new twist.

 (Want to find out how to be more creative and productive? Sign up for my free monthly Brainstorm e-bulletin. Just send an email request to [email protected].)

 

Success in writing by not being a writer

I recently received the present of a copy of the book, “Fierce Pajamas,” an anthology of humor writing from the New Yorker. One of the essays is called “How to Achieve Success as a Writer.” It was written in 1936 by Ruth Suckow. Here are some excerpts:

 “You can achieve success as a writer by not being a writer….The surefire way to achieve success as a writer is to be a celebrity in any other line….As soon as any flier reaches the end of his flight, he may find that he is a writer. Sports is a good line, on the whole…Baseball stars, sprinters, swimmers, even prize-fighters, need have little or no trouble with their writing.

 The government offers broad opportunities for success in writing by not being writers—to Presidents, ex-Presidents, First Ladies, ex-First Ladies; in fact, to all government officials and ex-government officials.

 Nearly all the girls and boys of today hope to become movie stars. They could adopt no better method of achieving versatility as writers…once they are stars, beauty hints, health hints, hostess hints, fashion hints, and suggestions for interior-decorating will flow from their pens, putting the experts to shame….[and] articles telling why they’ll never get divorced from their wives just before they get divorced from their wives. ….A movie star will have spare time to turn out a novel or two, and a bit of profound philosophy…”

 Some things have not changed in the last 70 years.

(If you want to write despite not being a celebrity, see my book, "Your Writing Coach," and the associated website: www.yourwritingcoach.com)

Setting your writing goals: rule number two

In the previous post I mentioned the first rule of writing goals: set word or page goals, not time goals. The second major rule is:

Keep moving forward! 

No U-turns to keep going over and over what you've done already. Forge ahead until you've done a first draft, then go back and start to rewrite. 

If you have ideas about rewriting that you're afraid you might forget, jot them down, then carry on. 

(For more tips on writing, see my book, "Your Writing Coach," and the website at www.yourwritingcoach.com)

Setting your writing goals: rule number one

Recently I had the pleasure of meeting a writers group in Rancho Mirage and listening to some of their work—which was of excellent quality (this was a relief, as I tend to be truthful in my reactions and that can be uncomfortable when it’s not up to snuff, even when you’re being constructive). Anyway, we also had an informal Q &A session, and they asked me what was the number one thing I’d learned about how to be disciplined in my use of writing time. I realized that it was actually something very simple:

 Set word or page goals, not time goals.

 In other words, on days you intend to write, don’t say, “I’ll write for two hours today.” It’s too easy to fritter that time away doing research that’s not really necessary, or deciding to do one more outline, or re-reading what you’ve done already. All of those may be necessary at times, but they’re not writing.

 When you say, “I will write 1000 words today,” that’s unambiguous. When the day is over, either you wrote 1000 words or you didn’t.

 Keep the goal realistic, give yourself time off when you need it, and don’t beat yourself up if you miss the target sometimes. But do set the target and get as close as you can to meeting it every writing session. Soon those thousand words per day will add up to a story, article, book or a screenplay. 

(If procrastination is something you'd like to overcome, sign up for my free eight-part mini-course at www.tameyourinnercritic.com.)

How to use pressure to drive your story (Jon Vorhaus says)

How to use pressure to drive your story (Jon Vorhaus says…)

In his book, “Creativity Rules,” published in 2000 by Silman-James Press, John Vohaus discusses how to use pressure and conflict to drive your story forward in a way that will keep the reader wondering what will happen next. Here are a few of his tips, starting with what he calls the “change bomb,” the thing that starts the action of your story:

“[One] way to plant the change bomb is just to ask what does my character value most in the world and how can I take it away? You want your change bomb to be a vigorous event.

The truth is revealed under pressure.

Even if you don’t like conflict, learn to confront your characters.

Look for types of pressure appropriate to the type of story you’re telling.

Just by listing the types of pressures present in your story, you give yourself lots of new information about where your story might go. It helps when you get stuck. Instead of asking ‘what happens next?’ ask ‘what new pressure can I introduce?’

The pressure/response piston:
• Pressure: Cory had a crush on a new girl, Rochelle.
• Response: He asked her for a date.
• Pressure: She laughed in his face.
• Response: He ran away.
• Pressure: She told all his friends.

Pressure should escalate. Return to your theme, and orient your escalating pressures around it. Theme is your train. Pressure is your engine.

To cure stalling, make each event bigger than the last. Don’t fear the wrong choice.”

(Another book that will help you create powerful stories is my own “Your Writing Coach,” published by Nicholas Brealey and available at online and offline retailers. For more information, see www.yourwritingcoach.com.)

Can hypnosis help you be a better writer?

I've had training in hypnosis and NLP and am always interested in how hypnosis can be used to help people. One experiment reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute used a group of 200 people scheduled to undergo breast biopsies or lumpectomies. Half of them were given a fifteen-minute hypnosis session, the others received routine anesthesia and nondirective empathic listening. The hypnotized patients experienced less pain, nausea, discomfort and anxiety without medication following surgery, and spent 10.6 fewer minutes in the operating room. This also resulted in a saving of almost $800 per patient for Mount Sinai School of Medicine.

That's pretty powerful, isn't it? So can hypnosis help you be a better writer, too? I believe it can. If you're interested in finding out more about how, go to www.timetowrite.com and click on the "trances" tab on the left. You'll find an explanation and some trances you can download (for a modest fee).

What publishers really do (and don't)

On his personal branding blog, Dan Schwable interviewed author and speaker Phil Town (picture at left), who made this observation about publishers:

“The key thing to understand about the publishing industry is that they don’t sell books, they publish them.” Since they don’t sell books, they look for authors who can sell the books if they publish them. This ability is highly prized. They will pay you a lot of money for your book if you can show them how it will be sold in large enough quantities that they’ll not only get their money back but also make a profit.”

He adds: Here’s the marketing tip of the century: create a large group of fans who will buy your book before you write your book.”

And that's where building up your presence on Facebook, or via a blog or a podcast, or Twitter, and other ways to reach people with interesting and useful or entertaining material comes in. It's harder to do for fiction, unless you are in a niche (like Civil War novels) that allows you to find likely fans.

Being creative when there's no time

On his coachcreativespace.com blog, creativity coach Dan Goodwin gave some tips for how to create amidst the “imperfect chaos” of everyday life. The one I think was best:

" Forgive yourself. Ultimately, the only person that tells you that you don’t create enough, or often enough, is you...It’s easy to get into an all or nothing mentality, and think if you can’t create for 25 hours a day then why bother creating at all? 

It’s so important to be kind to yourself, and forgive yourself for not creating every second of the day, for making mistakes, for some days not creating at all. None of us is perfect. Yes, even you! Treat yourself as you would an artist friend - encourage, nurture, challenge, but forgive yourself your imperfections. They’re what makes you you, and means that no-one else creates like you create."

(for tips on how to be both more creative and more productive, sign up for my free monthly Brainstorm e-bulletin. Just send an email request now to [email protected])

Here's how they write "Lost"

It's funny but I'm not sure it's not true...

An evening of shaky impro reminded me of these writing truths

The other evening I went to see an improvisation group that was brave but not having an especially good night. 

I trained in impro years ago with a group called The Groundlings, so I know how tough it is to come up with ideas on the spur of the moment and make them work when there's at least one other person in the scene who is also coming up with ideas that may or may  not jibe with yours. 

But it did remind me that the same things that make a scene come alive on the stage can also be used to make one come alive on the page:

* adding a new character so the dynamics of the scene change; this works best if the character has something definite (and emotional) on his or her mind, rather than just being a bystander;

* adding a new emotion from one of the characters, as long as you can justify it;

* remembering that conflict that comes from "and" often works better than conflict that comes from "but." In other words, if one character says "I want to buy your car," and the other one says, "But you can't, it's not for sale," most likely you will end up with static conflict of the yes/no variety. If one says, "I want to buy your car," and the other one says, "Yes, I'll be happy to sell it to you, and will you be paying the $50,000 in cash?" then the first one can respond to that inflated price and the scene can build.

In simplistic dramas (like most action pictures) the conflict is of the "but" variety; in the more sophisticated fare (and our own lives) it tends to come more from the "ands."

Being reminded of these ideas when I'm in the middle of writing a script made the experience useful ...and I'm glad I wasn't up on that stage.

(for ideas on how to be more creative and productive, sign up for my free monthly Brainstorm e-bulletin--just send an email request now to [email protected])

Why it's hard to write a romantic comedy these days

I'm working on a romantic comedy script and am realizing how difficult it is to do these days. Why? Because a romantic comedy relies on reasons to keep the lovers apart until near the end of the story. And these days, there are fewer obstacles to work with. 

In some of the classic stories it was relatively easy to create misunderstandings--after all, Juliet couldn't just text Romeo to tell him there's been a change of plans. 

Whether family members will approve of the match is pretty much out the window nowadays, too. 

Then there was the issue of maintaining one's virginity, we can forget about that one.

Also, in the old days (even the 1950's) it was kind of a scandal to break an engagement or, God forbid, change your mind at the last minute about marrying somebody. 

Furthermore, these days the audience will blame the girl for being involved with the "Bellamy" in the first place (that's the boring character she's with instead of the exciting guy she meets--named after actor Ralph Bellamy, who specialized in those roles for a while).

Wait a minute, what if he's a hypochondriac and she has swine flu? Yes, a story ripped from today's headlines! 

(OK, I'd better go easy on the Red Bull...)

Expert advice on writing and selling your book - Rick Frishman

The previous post contained a suggestion from author, publisher and speaker Rick Frishman. Today I follow up with some more advice from him, this one courtesy of an interview with him at the success systems now newsletter.

 On book titles: “Titles should be one to four words. There is a study that showed bestselling books since 1902. They all had a one to four word titles.”

 On (not) writing: “you don’t need to be a great writer to be an author. You need to know a great writer to be an author. I have a fabulous ghost writer that takes my content and energy and takes my stuff and then he knows how to write. I talk my books, he puts it down, sends it back to me, we edit it back and forth, back and forth, and lo and behold we have a book. Because he is a great writer.”

 [My note: if you’re interested in making money writing, one approach could be to seek out people who have expertise and, ideally, some kind of recognition, and offer to cowrite a book proposal with them—note that I say a book proposal; you don’t have to write the whole book in order to find out whether a publisher will want it. But do make sure you have a deal in place (I suggest 50-50) before you do anything else. And make sure your coauthor is willing to participate in the marketing of the book.]

 On his publishing house (Morgan James): “We look for books on how to make money, how to be agood parent, how to make a gazillion dollars on the internet. We just had a book become a huge best seller last week which is, “How I Made a Million Dollars on the Internet and How You Can Too.” …You can be a first time author. You don’t have to have other books. What you do have to have is a platform. Which is the golden word in publishing and what that is, is if I am thinking of publishing your book, what I want to know is what are you going to do to sell your book?”

(Establishing your platform is one of the topics covered in my book, “Your Writing Coach,” published by Nicholas Brealey. You can get it from Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and other online and offline retailers.)

What every writer should know about pitching articles

In his Author 101 newsletter, Rick Frishman suggests this formula for pitching your appearance on a talk show or radio show. Say you will cover:

 What every _______should know about ______.

 For example, What every mother should know about swine flu, or What every man should know about women’s fantasies.

 It’s also a great formula for pitching articles to magazines or web sites, because it instantly arouses curiosity.

 It could even work as the formula for chapter titles within a book.

 (You can find out more about Rick Frishman’s services at www.rickfrishman.com or www.author101.com.

 (For guidance in how to write your book, get my book, “Your Writing Coach”—see www.yourwritingcoach.com for more information.)

The most important thing to know about time management

I love this quote from the book "The Big Leap: conquer your hidden fear and take life to the next level," by Gay Hendricks:

"You’ll never have enough money to buy all the stuff you don’t really need, and you’ll never have enough time to do all the things you really don’t want to do."

He adds:

 "Our Newtonian concept of both time and money is built on scarcity. The advertising industry thrives on the fact that they know this and most of us don’t. Advertising encourages us to want a lot of things we don’t really need. It also encourages us to want to do a lot of things we don’t really want to do."

The books reminds us: We are the boss of time, not the slave of time. That's so easy to forget...

(Once you've figured out what you really want, don't let procrastination stop you. For my free mini-course in overcoming procrastination, sign up at www.tameyourinnercritic.com.)

How to be a best-selling (not a best-writing) author (says Robert Kiyosaki)

Robert Kiyosaki, the author “Rich Dad, Poor Dad,” which has been on the New York Times best-seller list for six years, told Steve Harrison’s National Publicity Summit that he doesn’t consider himself a best-writing author—but a best-selling author. In other words, he thinks of himself as an entrepreneur rather than an author. 

 That book was rejected by publisher after publisher, so he self-published and self-promoted it and now it has sold more than 26 million copies. He started with a thousand copies and got major interviews by placing an ad in the Radio and Television Interview Report, which led to Borders offering to stock the book.

 He considered the book a way to sell a game he’d developed to help people understand investing and accounting. The game sold for $200, so the profit margin was a lot bigger than the profit on the book (although 26 million copies later, the royalties can’t be too bad, either).

 He said one of the main reasons most business books don’t sell is that they’re boring—they say nothing new. His advice, in short: say something new and learn how to sell.

 (Steve Harrison’s site is www.yourquantumleap.com)

(For tips on how to make sure your book will sell right from the start, get my book, "Your Writing Coach," published by Nicholas Brealey. It includes crucial chapters on using both traditional and new media marketing.)