Category: Other Cool Blogs

Other Cool Blogs: Magical Words May 13, 2014

Erin Penn

Image courtesy of Sira Anamwong at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Characters Who Matter

Found it! I remember this post – it has hung on the edges of my mind as a MUST for writing since the first time I read it. Now I have it again, and I am not letting go (mwahahaha).

But I will share.

Darynda Jones. Magical Words May 13, 2014. How I Make My Characters Unforgettable.

A lot of people talk about characters needing likability. More importantly, reader need to connect to the character before anything happens to make them disconnect. Disconnect too soon and they won’t read. Don’t have a disconnect and the narrative becomes boring instead of tension driven; readers do not want Mary Sue, a perfect person.

What Ms. Jones defines is how to get that connection and how soon.

<A writer> must create empathy BEFORE introducing any negative flaws in <the> character, anything that will distance us from the reader.

There are five ways to create empathy: (Need to use AT LEAST two of these.)

          Sympathy
          Jeopardy
          Likability
          Power
          Humor

Read the full post here: http://www.magicalwords.net/specialgueststars/darynda-jones-how-i-make-my-characters-unfogettable/

Other Cool Blogs: Bad Redhead Media January 21, 2017

Erin Penn

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

All-The-Things

I want Mad Skillz. Not just as an author, but all things publishing.

  1. Writing from first draft to final
  2. Editing from content to proofing
  3. Arting from cover to full-wraps
  4. Digitizing from formatting to upload
  5. Mathing from price points to bills
  6. Marketing from social media to conventions.

Oh, wait, there is more – beta teams, websites, keywords… Rachel Thompson in her guest spot on BadRedhead Media explains “This is Why Authors Shouldn’t Do It All“.

Specialization is a thing, folks. When looking at budgets during self-publishing, temptation rises to #doallthethings. Realize for anything thing you do other than writing mean YOU ARE NOT WRITING. If someone else can do it faster, better, spending money (with your publisher hat on as I describe under my Yog’s Law post last year) is a real option. Especially for other true specialties like cover art and editing.

You may want to juggle all the ideas, but, when it comes down to it, the best marketing is having books for people to come across. This mean writing should be primary in a writer’s career.

Other Cool Blogs: Magical Words 1/25/2008

Erin Penn

Image courtesy of photoexplorer at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

New Marketing: Short Story and Novel Combos

Marketing is constantly changing. The new media model is packages and crossing mediums. Don’t just create a movie, but get a graphic novel, a novelization of the movie, and a short TV series if you can. Toys, fast food, … you live in the world, you know how this works.

For books, write a novel and a couple short stories (and pray for the one-in-a-million movie deal). One of the short stories should be sold to an anthology to point readers to your larger (and more profitable) piece. The other short story should be offered for free as a sampler, and point to your larger piece. A series of 99 cent short story ebooks on Amazon pointing to the larger piece is also a workable option.

All those side stories which bounced around in your head but didn’t make the final cut can now be used. Those little exercises to develop side characters and explore backstory which went into the writer’s trunk can be dusted off.

But it is more than just a cool way to use up your excess words. Creating short stories is rapidly becoming a requirement for engagement with your readers. The more bits of your novel out there, the more chance a reader to discover your novel and pay you so you can write another one. The more times your readers play in your world, the more they will want to see of the world.

David B. Coe, of Magical Words, gives examples of how creating stories can help with worldbuilding a new world for a series in “Doing as I Say”. Written in 2008, the series he is referring to developing is Thieftaker. 

WRITING EXERCISE: For your present long-form Work-In-Progress (WIP), look at your backstory or side characters. Can one be made into a short story of between 3,000 and 10,000 words? Could breaking out the story as a stand-alone provide fan service of a detail unneeded for the novel but cool to know? Write a scene from the short story of 1,000 words or less.

Other Cool Blogs: Superhero Novels

Erin Penn

Image courtesy of vectorolie at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

I love superpower prose from Jim Bernheimer’s Confessions of a D-List Supervillain to Liana Brooks’ Even Villains Fall In Love. I read comics veraciously as a child and  love the new age of novels mashing superheroes with tons of other options: mystery, YA, romance, and thriller. I’ve even taken a stab at it with my flashes (for example The Bleue Toscano Eggs of Power and There You Are). Eventually, I hope to put Ice Queen in her own romantic series.

A fellow superpower aficionado , Eric Searleman, has a site dedicated to reviewing superpower prose. It features lots and lots and lots of new books to add to my to-be-read list.

If you love superpower prose as much as I do, you might want to bookmark the Superhero Novels website. (The website is no longer responding as of 7/21/2020. It was superheronovels.com).