Time to Write

Would you go to the Boring Conference?

Boring Conference is back..although I wasn't aware that it had been here before. It's listed as "a celebration of the outwardly ordinary, mundane and prosy but which, on peeking beneath the surface, reveal hitherto undreamed of depths."

It takes place in London on Saturday, May 31. In the three previous Boring Conferences topics have included sneezing, toast, and yellow lines (on the road).

No word yet on this year's apparently boring topics. I would suggest accounting, lint, and nasal hair (if you are a fan of any, don't take offence, obviously I trust that all three of these have hidden thrills).

The first tickets wil be released on Feb. 28, see BoringConference.com for more information. 

What actually caught my attention wasn't just the Conference but the fact that I think a lot of writing either reveals the extraordinary aspects of the ordinary, or the ordinary aspects of the extraordinary. I guess reality shows specialize in the latter, although as they run out of topics, increasingly they are revealing the ordinary aspects of ordinary subjects (Cupcake Wars anyone?).

Writers probably don't need to attend the Conference (although it might be enjoyable) because looking beneath the surface is a big part of the process. Checking whether you've revealed enough of that in what you've written might also be a good strategy for your second draft.

Promote your book with selfies

Whether you self-publish your book or get published traditionally, one of the hardest challenges you will face is getting your work to the attention of potential customers. The "selfies' phenomenon--people taking their own pictures and posting them everywhere online--has been much in the news lately. Here's a way you can take advantage of it.

WHAT’S THE IDEA? 

People’s desire to take selfies isn’t going away any time soon. Invite your followers to take a picture of themselves with your book and email it to you. 

Award prizes for most unusual facial expression, most unusual location, best selfie with pet and book. The more categories you come up with, the more winners. The more winners the better!

Make the prizes downloadable so it doesn’t cost you anything to send them. For instance, each person could get a pdf of a certificate of their win, plus wallpaper for their computer, a mini-poster for them to print out, or an exclusive short-short story featuring some of the characters in your book (maybe a couple of the minor characters). 

Of course cash always motivates people, so consider also having money awards for the top three. It doesn’t have to be a lot—£10, £25 and £50 or $25, $50 and $75 would be sufficient to drive entries.

WHY IT WORKS

The thing people find most interesting is…themselves. This contest capitalizes on that.

WHERE TO PUBLICIZE IT:

Publicize your contests on your web site and blog, social media, your YouTube channel and via free press releases. Also send information to websites that cater to amateur photographers.

BONUS IDEA 

Get a local coffee shop to let you put all the winners on a wall for a few days and get your local newspaper to write about it.

For inspiration on how else to market your book cheaply and creatively, get a copy of my book, Do Something Different, published by Virgin Books and available from Amazon or your other favorite bookseller.

The biggest mistake in writing for children

Children's author and writing teacher Kathi Appelt was asked by The Writer magazine what she thinks is the biggest mistake newer writers make when writing children's books:

"The major mistake is 'saving the hero'. In real life, our job as adults is to provide assistance and counsel to children. But in fiction, young heroes (be they children or child substitutes, such as kittens, puppies, and so on) must tackle the obstacles and solve the story problem on their own."

I'd take that even one step farther: kids love reading about children who are able to solve problems that adults can't. In my animated series, "Norman Normal," Norman was the only normal kid in a family of superheroes, yet most of the time he was the one that ended up solving the problem. Kids yearn for the power to be independent and to tell adults what to do for a change.

However, that doesn't mean making your young protagonist perfect. Appelt warns, "We writers also have to let that main character struggle. If the obstacles to a goal aren't large enough, then readers won't care about the main character. What young readers want are imperfect heroes who get into a fix and then have to struggle to get themselves out--or not."

Good advice--in fact, it's advice I'm going to have to take myself in writing the second draft of the YA novel I'm working on. I realize that I've made things a little too easy for my protagonist, I'm going to have to be meaner!

 

What we want in fiction is not what we want in life

In the previous post I quoted prolific novelist Peter Abrahams on setting your daily writing goal. In his interview a while back in The Writer magazine, he also talked about what makes for a good story:

"My mother, Enid, taught me most of what I know about writing when I was about 10. Among her rules:

Fiction is about reversals. Just like high school wrestling, it's more fun to watch a back and forth match than a blowout.

Torment your protagonist.

Push everyhing as far as you can without contriving.

Get everything you can out of a story. Don't leave the gold mine only partly dug, but stop before you do anything that leaves the reader feeling your behind-the-scenes presence or thinking that terrible thought: That couldn't happen.

Always advance the story."

I'd say he was lucky to have learned those at his mother's knee, and it underscores how simple storytelling is. Of course, "simple" and "easy" are not the same thing, more's the pity!

 

Why setting a "words per day" goal isn't enough

Many writers set a goal of working on their project for a certain amount of time per day. The danger is that it can be easy to rationalize that spending that time researching your topic on the internet counts, even though you end up spending "a few minutes" checking your email, reading the news, or updating your Facebook account.

In that case, you might say, why not set a word goal: a certain number of pages to be written per day or per week?

Well, that's better but maybe not quite good enough. In an interview in The Writer magazine, prolific novelist Peter Abrahams came up with a better solution:

"My goal is to put in about a thousand words a day and to advance the story."

He explains: "Those are two separate goals because you could write 1000 words a day without really getting anywhere."

In other words, if you write a thousand words describing the protagonist's house but nothing has moved forward in the story, it would be a good idea either to keep writing more or (preferably) figuring out what you can combine with that description that will advance the story.

A good test for any scene or chapter: What's different at the end? If nothing at all has changed, that could be a cause for concern.

Usually this change affects one or more of your main characters. Sometimes their situation is just different, but normally it is either better or worse relative to what they want it to be.

I think it's good not to get obsessed with this in your first draft, otherwise you may find yourself rewriting too much rather than forging ahead. However, it's an excellent method for assessing your first draft and figuring out what you would like to change in your second.

Abrahams and I are both talking about mainstream novels, not experimental ones; in the latter, anything goes. In the former, readers want the story to keep moving. 

(For more tips on writing your project from the idea all the way through to the finished version, see my book, Your Writing Coach. It's published by Nicholas Brealey and is avaiable from Amazon or your other favorite bookseller.)

Creativity Now: A message seen only by children

How can you get a message to abused children who are out in public with their abusers?

One group designed ads on bus shelters that include a message likely to be seen only by children.

The key is a lenticular layer that shows one message from one angle and a different message from another angle.

Since children under ten are shorter than most adults, the low angle reveals the message, "If somebody hurts you, phone us and we'll help you" and an easy to remember phone number.

At adult height, the message visible is "Sometimes child abuse is only visible to the child suffering it."

You can see a video of it here: http://www.wimp.com/secretmessage/

If you come across a particularly creative solution to a problem, let me know about it at [email protected] and i'll feature it in a future Creativity Now post. Thanks!

(Want tips and strategies for being more creative? You'll find them in my full-colour book, Creativity Now, published by Pearson and available from Amazon or your other favorite bookseller.)

Would you like a free monthly dose of inspiration? Here's how to get it.

Just a quick reminder: If you want to get a free monthly dose of inspiration for how to be more creative and more productive, that's exactly what my Brainstorm & Focus eBulletin provides. You get 5 quick, practical tips and an inspiring quote in each issue. You can sign up now using the form at the right. 

Create your own coffee shop

I just returned from Los Angeles where every coffee shop is full of earnest people working on their laptops, writing the next Great American Screenplay (many pages of superheroes, explosions, drones, etc.).

Starbucks and some others provide abundant power points so battery power becomes irrelevant and now the fact that some writers stay for hours after buying one cup of coffee is becoming an issue. Some coffee shops have removed the power points, others have put up signs suggesting that an hour or so is a reasonable time to linger over one cup.

If you like writing with the sound of a coffee shop but don't have one handy (or they throw you out after an hour...) there are several sites that allow you to listen to coffee shop background noise.

One is coffitivity.com (corrected link). It's also available as an app for Mac desktop, iPad & iPhone and Android).

Another is soundrown.com--there you have the choice of coffee shop (a bit noiser than the one at Coffeeitivity), waves, birds, and fire (as in fireplace ).

If where you normally write is too quet, or the wrong kind of noisy, using headphones with one of these can help (especially noise-cancelling headphones).  You may get the same benefits as working in a coffee shop--but with cheaper coffee and no chance you'll be evicted after an hour.

Related articles

How to write in your sleep

Creativity: how to drink from the (mental) fountain of youth

“There is a fountain of youth: it is your mind, your talents, the creativity you bring to your life and the lives of people you love. When you learn to tap this source, you will truly have defeated age.”                                                                          --Sophia Loren

You don't have to be older to drink from that particular fountain of youth. Here are a few suggestions that will help you tap in to it:

* Write a poem about what you want from the rest of your life. Don't worry about rhyme scheme or other rules, this one is for your eyes and heart alone (unless you want to share it, in which case, do!)

* Draw a picture of one thing that is great about your life. Worry as much about getting the drawing perfect as a four-year-old would. Stick figures are fine.

* Remember that thing you used to love to eat when you were a kid but you haven't had it for years? Have it this week. If it's not around anymore, get creative with ingredients and see how close you can get to making it yourself.

* Send somebody a postcard with an enigmatic message on it. Something like, "This reminded me of that time at the McDonald's! Remember how much that old man laughed? Get in touch, it's been too long! - B. It'll give them something to think about for days.

* Get 20 one-dollar bills or one pound coins (or whatever your currency is) and as you go about your day leave them at twenty different places where somebody will find them. You'll have made twenty people's day brighter. 

* Make up your own things to do, after all this is about being creative. And feel free to share your ideas in the comments.

(If you enjoy being creative I think you'll also like my book, Creativity Now, published by Pearson and available from Amazon or your other favorite bookseller.)

 

 

 

 

The price and the pleasure of doing (too) many different things

If you are drawn to writing many different kinds of things, we're kindred spirits. Fulfilling that desire can bring a lot of pleasure and sometimes unexpected pay-offs, but it also has a price.

When I first went to Hollywood I wanted to write all kinds of scripts: films, sitcoms, plays, animation, hour-long dramas. On top of that, I was drawn to several genres: comedies, dramas, thrillers, even Westerns. I wrote all kinds of sample scripts and got nowhere until a friend pointed out something that should have been obvious: if it's hard to break in to any one of these, trying to get into all of them at the same time is going to diffuse your energy and effort so much you probably won't break in to any of them.

I decided to focus on sitcoms, partly because I felt I had a knack for comedy, partly because there were lots of sitcoms using free-lance writers in those days. It worked. I got assignements writing for Benson, Family Ties, Too Close for Comfort and others.

However, the desire to write lots of different kinds of things never sent away. Probably I would have had more success (at least as conventionally defined) if I'd stuck to sitcoms. I didn't want to do that, and I was able to branch out and also wrote TV movies, feature films (mostly script doctoring), one-hour episodes, animated shows and more. The genres included thrillers, drama, comedy and a Western TV movie that was going to be made for CBS until the executive who'd commissioned it left and his replacement threw it out.

I also wanted to live somewhere different--namely, London. That's REALLY not recommended if you want to continue to write for US television and film. I was able to keep up the connections and the assignments for a couple of years but then, probably inevitably, the connections loosened and eventually disappeared. Fortunately I was able to find lots of work in Europe.

I think if you are drawn to expressing yourself in a variety of ways that's an important part of who you are. You can put it aside for a while, and it may be wise to do so, but eventually it will come back. I believe the trick is to embrace it rather than resist it, and to accept that there may be a price to pay as well. If you handle it strategically you can minimize the cost.

One advantage these days is that there are so many channels through which you can express your creativity. If making money with everything you do isn't essential you can, for example, focus on one type of writing for your income but do others as a sideline and share those via your website or YouTube or Facebook or Pinterest or other forms of social media.

Or you can get together with some fellow creators, hire a space for a night or a week and  screen your films, hang your paintings, recite your poetry, do your comedy improv, or whatever it is you want to do.

Occasionally that pays off in an unexpected way. I just read in the Los Angeles Times how a couple of animators who created a short cartoon film just to show at some local screenings were contacted as a result by a network who has commissioned a series based on the characters in that short film. 

Sometimes the things we make for fun benefit from not having deadlines or the baggage of expectations and lead to the more traditional type of success; other times they just help us keep our sanity.

 

Is it really bad to use your iPad or other tablet before bedtime?

You may have read about a study that showed looking at iPads and other tablets at night can suppress melatonin and delay the ability to go to sleep.

Being addicted to my iPad, I took a closer look at the study.

It showed there was no effect after one hour. The effect did appear after two hours, and how strong it was depended on how far the tablet was from the eyes, and the light level of the app. 

Smart phone screens and computer screens can have the same effect. The study’s authors wrote, “We recommend dimming these devices at night as much as possible in order to minimize melatonin suppression, and limiting the amount of time spent using these devices prior to bedtime.”

It makes a good case for what many of us used to to—reading a good (printed) book before going to sleep.

Would you censor your writing due to the NSA?

“Chilling Effects: NSA Surveillance Drives U.S. Writers to Self-Censor" is the title of a survey of American authors conduced by the FDR Group for the PEN American Center toward the end of last year.

They surveyed more than 500 writers to find out whether and how awareness of the see-all, know-all practices of the NSA might be affecting their writing.

Here are some of the results:

* Have avoided writing or speaking about a particular topic : 16%

* Have seriously considered avoiding it: another 11%

* Have curtailed or avoided social media activities: 28%

* Have seriously considered doing so: another 12%

A larger proporation of the writers disapproved of the government's wholesale collection of data than was true of the general population: 66% vs. 44%.

Do these writers censor their private communications because they know the NSA can access those at will, or do they censor what they write publicly because they assume the NSA has people monitoring what is said and written in magazines, online, in speeches, etc.? Or both?

At least 16%, and up to 27% if we include the "seriously considered it" group, must believe there is a real danger of some kind of reprisal or penalty for expressing their views in their private and/or public writing or speaking. That's different from just generally feeling that the NSA is going overboard with data collection.

Are they paranoid? What about the old, "If you've done nothing wrong, you have nothing to worry about" assurance?  

I'm old enough to have participated in anti-VietNam War demonstrations and I wonder how those would have played out if today's technology had been available to the authorities then. 

Or what if Richard Nixon had had today's  level of information about the people on his Enemies List?

Or if J. Edgar Hoover had been able to misuse it to destroy the civil rights movement?

I can't say that fear has stopped me from expressing myself; the main problem has been that I am planning to write a satire about what happens when one character mistakenly gets on a list of people suspected of terrorism, but the reality of what's happening keeps getting more and more bizarre.

For example, see my recent post about the Disney/NSA cartoon designed to get kids used to the idea that drones will be watching their every action--not only to protect them from terrorists but also from not fastening their seat belts.    

It's hard to satirize that kind of reality.

I hope writers and others don't stop themselves from speaking out. The right to do that without fear is at the very core of freedom.

After all, Patrick Henry didn't say, "I may disagree with what you say, so shut up or else!"

Would you attend a reading party?

It's interesting that sometimes we enjoy doing solitary things in the company of other people. One example that was new to me is Reading Parties. The Stranger.com reports that The Fireside Room at the Sorrento Hotel in Seatle has such a party once a month and it always packs the room, which looks a lot like an old-fashioned gentlemen's club.

This isn't a book club; everybody brings a book, magazine, or newspaper of their choice and quietly reads it by the fire and sips a drink. Manhattans are on sale for $5 each. 

Among the recent reading material was The New York Times, A Brief History of Curating, and Moby Dick.

Apparently speaking in hushed tones is allowed and some couples appeared to be there on a date, while others may have been hoping the evening might lead them to a kindred reading spirit.

Some of the members of my MAD (Massive Action Day) program did something similar online; they declared a reading day and at the start of the day each person shared (in a chat window) the title of what they were reading, and then they checked in with each other every couple of hours to share ideas, reactions, questions, etc. (To find out more about the MAD, go to http://www.MassiveActionDay.com)

Of course writing is also a solitary activity and it's well known that many writers like to write in a coffee shop, library, or other public place. I'm in Los Angeles at the moment, where about 50% of the people you find in any Starbucks are writing a screenplay. 

If you're feeling stuck in your writing, try doing it in a public place, it might give you the stimulation or sense of comfort you need. On the other hand if you already do that a lot, try writing in a private space; sometimes it's the change that is stimulating, not the specific type of venue.

(For lots of right-brain tips on writing, get a copy of Your Writing Coach, available from Amazon or your other favorite bookseller.)

 

Cartoon indoctrination: Your Friend, the Drone!

In the previous post I wrote about how films can help improve people's relationships. Of course there's another side to the use of film: indoctrination. A current example is a Disney kids' series that features a Ladybug with a camera mounted on her, who monitors children's every move and alerts the authorities when something is amiss. Like a chld not wearing a seat belt, for instance.

Or maybe Daddy peeking at some naughty program online?

Or the housekeeper mentioning that she's in the oountry illegally?

Or Junior saying he doesn't like the government?

I had to double-check that this is for real, but apparently it is. Have a look, and be sure to stay with it past the opening song (the video is about 3.5 minutes long in all):

Hey kids, haven't you always wanted a Big Brother who will look out for you? Well, he's here!

Coming soon: Terry the Terrior Tears Up the Constitution

How movies can help prevent divorce (no joke!)

We often wonder about the negative impact certain kinds of movies might have, but there’s some heartening news about the potential positive effects of films. According to Science Daily, “Discussing five movies about relationships over a month could cut the three-year divorce rate for newlyweds in half, researchers report. The study, involving 174 couples, is the first long-term investigation to compare different types of early marriage intervention programs.

The findings show that an inexpensive, fun, and relatively simple movie-and-talk approach can be just as effective as other more intensive therapist-led methods -- reducing the divorce or separation rate from 24 to 11 percent after three years.”

This compares favorably with more sophisticated and expensive approaches to preventing the breakdown of marriages. The idea is to ask couples to watch the films and see whether they recognize any of their own behaviors, as well as to note the effects of certain kinds of behaviors on relationships.

 One of the movies used was Two for the Road, from 1967, which tracks a relationship over the course of a dozen years. 

The online version of the list of films and suggested questions for discussion is here: http://www.rochester.edu/news/divorce-rate-cut-in-half-for-couples-who-discussed-relationship-movies/movie-list.html 

This wasn’t part of the study, but it seems to me that one of the exciting implications is that watching certain types of movies with your kids and discussing them afterward could also be helpful in shaping their behavior constructively.